Lagann: 2nd Spin
by Winton Rain
Summary: 25 years have passed since the end of Gurren Lagann. Spiral Nemesis fears, Anti-Human sentiment, and the galactic wild west make for enough trouble for the universe. Enter the Gurren Lagann Agency, a covert team who will protect and save the universe from any threats that will come their way. It's going to be a wild ride, get ready to spin on again.
1. P5: Help Me Simon

Prologue 5

 _Another Time, Another Place_

Parliament Tower, once known as a bane to humanity's existence, was now a beacon of hope. The tower held only the most elite members of society, the ones who would guide humanity. It is very uncharacteristic to have drama overpower the voices of logic and reason in an environment as regal and professional as this one.

Today is not that day.

A woman, long slender legs, red heels. She balanced on her feet perfectly as her footsteps stomped along the marble floor. Her long pink dress was clean, she was obviously someone of power in society as well. She presented herself fairly well normally, but for whatever reason today, she was a "pissing off person". Another woman in green uniform, it looked professional, very secretarial, matched with her spectacles on her face. She held her back with whatever means in order to prevent the storming Princess from reaching her destination.

"Princess Nia," the brown haired woman calmly tried to allay her, "You're not supposed to be here until lunch. Simon is not expecting you until-" her voice escalating as Nia fought her way through the door to reach this, Simon person. Upon opening the door she saw him, this man, this blue haired man with a regal blue and red trimmed coat, white dress shirt and pants, it accentuated the contrast of his uniform. He looked a little quizzically at the door bursting open suddenly, the Princess right behind it.

"Supreme Commander Simon I-" "Leave us, Kinon." Simon calmly shut down the secretary, "It seems my wife has something very important to tell me." Kinon took her leave and closed the door silently. Now all bets were off, Nia let her frustrations out. "Tell me it's not true…"

Simon, noticeably putting on an act, puzzledly looked back, "What are you talkin-" "Don't lie to me!" She cut him off. "Simon, tell me the truth, what happened?" She choked back a little tears, fearing the worst from what he was about to say. As Simon put his drill pen down, he placed both hands on his executive mahogany desk and pushed himself up. "You are alive because of a choice I made." Nia briefly looked at his face, her instant horrified face, floral irises expanding as they reflected the shadow of the man who was once the real Simon the Digger, it was enough to culminate the anger to release a full open palm slap to his face. "Faack you Simon!" She just learned that word, obviously. "How dare you?" Nia wiped a tear away from her eye, "You really think by saving me, I wouldn't feel the burden of all you had to do to keep me alive? How cruel are you?"

"Cruel Nia?" Simon rhetorically snapped. Simon looked at her intently, arguing his point and escalating his voice to a fever pitch, "Cruel!? This whole Godforsaken universe is cruel: Kamina and Kittan and Makken and Kid and Iraak and Zorthy, heck, we even lost Balinbow and Jorgun, and you think I can take one more loss? The one blessing in my life? This world is not perfect! A million humans on earth, and you had to win the lottery and be some pawn for the enemy!" he caught his breath as he fervently spoke, "And _I_ have to pay for that?"

Nia collected herself. With only the only way she knew how to respond, she sweetly and silently smiled, she shook her head. She opened her eyes, a hint of sadness, a hint of desperation, and plenty of love, she tugged at his lapels of his coat making the weight heavy. "Simon," she begged, "Please just take back every order you've set in action. Stop this right now. I...I...I…" she looked in an empty space on one of his shirt buttons, hoping it would stop the awkwardness of the situation. "I love you."

Simon hugged Nia intently, resting his chin on her head, "I love you too." He placed his hands on her shoulders and slowly extended her away, "So it pains me to do this. Guards!" Just then almost on cue, two armored masked enforcers came into the room, batons in hand. "Arrest the Princess on suspicion of treason, she is to be placed under house arrest at the Commander's Mansion." Nia couldn't believe what she was hearing, as she began to struggle her arms to grab hold of Simon, the guards grabbed her.

"Simon stop this! This is not what you want. I know your heart. Please stop this now!" It was almost as if everything was slow motion at that moment. The guards dragged the light Nia Teppelin farther and farther away from her freedom to speak. Nia saw his face, the stern face of someone deadly serious about the edict he just gave. His piercing eyes, staring at her as the elevator doors closed on her. Nia's eyes, those soft floral eyes, they darkened at the last second, "Have I lost you Simon?"

The elevator ride was long, it was the longest elevator ride down. Each floor made Nia's heart sink deeper and deeper. Her shock resonating in her mind as now she was a prisoner now to her own husband. They reached the ground floor. One of the guards gave her a slight nudge. "Come on Princess," he rushed her, "Your Gunlimo awaits." A Princess being held prisoner and being loaded into a Gunlimo? The thought was laughable. The Princess went in the backseat, a guard slowly and politely closing the door on her. That guard got immediately taken out by an unknown assailant. Nia was so sad, she never noticed this.

She just stared at the ground of the limo, wondering and collecting her thoughts, still in shock about what just happened. To snap her out of her trance, the driver opened his partition to speak to his passenger. "I'm sorry Princess," a familiar voice spoke. Princess Nia picked her head up slowly. "I wish this could be better circumstances. Unfortunately, you are now our prisoner." His reluctant face gave way as he turned his head slowly to focus on the road ahead of him. Nia realized the precocious danger she was in. She turned to her left. A muscular rooster came on that side of the door, blocking her escape. To the door she came from, they activated the safety lock to prevent her from attempting to roll out.

The driver stepped on his pedal with great gusto. The Gunlimo picking up speed, marching away as Nia could only frantically look at the back window as the sight of Parliament Tower began to get farther away. With one final breath she uttered one phrase, "Help me Simon!"


	2. C1: Welcome to the Agency

Chapter 1

 _Neo Neptune_

The name of this planet certainly has a ring to it. It's home away from home for the Humans of Earth. After the Earth Preservation Act that was passed 5 Earth years ago, half the population of Earth chose to mass exodus to this planet. The name of the planet was a misnomer. Whereas Neptune in our solar system is blue, the entire planet of Neo Neptune gives off a blackish hue. This is attributed to the constant black skies from the various chemistry of the gases which inhabit the atmosphere. To add to it, the entire planetary landscape and rock consists of 90% carbon. It's a very tough soil to grow, but manufacturing of high tech equipment is the main export of this planet.

A planet mainly lit up by the soft neon lights of various district. It is cyberpunk to the core. The populace has adapted so, wearing clothing laced with LEDs and bioluminescent trims. The sign to an establishment in the Shouko District buzzes incessantly, they must have not replaced the fluorescents in a while.

 _The Gunk Eye_

A man, hands in both of his jean pockets whipped his brown cape to his side before entering the establishment. He took his black-gloved right hand to adjust his brown cowboy hat, ruffling his short brown hair. He found the first seat he could in the establishment, this particularly empty establishment, save for maybe 3 people at the bar and a group of 5 at a table, and he began to listen to the news.

"In other news: Anti-Earth sentiment is on the rise these past months," the anchor announced as it showed flashes of riots, looting, and violence, "These are the sights from Neo Neptune as these organizations are steadily on the rise."

Neo Neptune, named because it was the 8th planet of its' respective solar system and one of the few to compose 80% of water surrounding the land masses. One of the many reasons humanity of Earth so easily got their hands on this planet. The main sovereignty of this solar system, which they called Kepler 616, was extremely grateful for humanity's achievement in ridding the universe of the oppression from the Anti-Spirals. A lot of Spiral Races were grateful. Earth was given gifts of planetary real estate, Neo Neptune was one of them.

But gratitude is easily taken advantage of, certain humans of Earth saw opportunity, cashing in the very planets owned by previous Spiral races. They began an excessive me-first mentality that irked the various Spiral races and over time this festered to become legitimate disdain. The news today just affirms that this is par for the course for humanity these years. These sentiments ran counter to someone who came on the news next to show a different side of humanity.

"President Rossiu," the television called out, "Is declaring a state of emergency to evacuate certain districts. He affirms that the miniature black hole hurricanes are in fact NOT caused by fluctuations in Spiral Nemesis energy, but they indeed are just isolated happenstances of Spiral energy getting out of control due to the unique science of the universe itself." President Rossiu showed himself on the TV. With body language reflecting a calm demeanor he basically acted out in front of his podium to allay the fears of the masses. "I assure you all, our best scientists are looking into this phenomena." "President!" a press member interjected, "Is this the Spiral Nemesis we've heard about? Is the Spiral energy crisis a big contributor to this?" Rossiu looked at the press member with a smile. "We don't know, all we know is that we need to prevent the loss of casualties and possibly prevent any further strain this is causing to the public." He took a deep breath. "To alleviate some fears we've begun an initiative which took place years ago, but is gaining full steam these past couple of months. If you notice, the usage of Spiral energy has dropped, reliance on electricity, solar power, and traditional energy means is at an all time high, and we can see this has lessened the occurrence of these mini black holes that have sucked up from what seems like isolated capsule spaces to entire homes."

"But President," another press member interjected, "We use Spiral energy for the Perception Teleportation Transit and military Grapearl squadron. Are you saying that you've limited the usage of these means as well?" The president nodded. "The Perception Teleportation Transit uses minimal Spiral energy and even if it did create a strain, I cannot deny the requirement to keep loved ones of all the races together and in constant communications." The president looked around at his audience, noticing worried press, family, and citizens.

"As you can see, peace is the name of the game these 25 years. We have many people who love us and hate us. By all means the humans of Earth are a very polarizing race. When we thought ourselves alone in the universe, we had no idea how hard it would be to reaffirm our stance that peace is what we wish." the lady to the right of Rossiu wiped his brow a bit. The hot lamps of the cameras shining on him, causing him great suffocation in the face of the lights. "The Grapearl squadron at this time is not needed for wars, we've reduced the Grapearls and have made local police to deal with any domestic matters on each one of our planetary installations." One last news reporter rose his hand, "But what about this so called Agency you have made that's above this local police, are you saying they don't use Spiral power at all for their enforcement?" Rossiu got serious for a second, but he regained his composure, "This rumored Agency you so speak of. If I were to have made one with this form of authority, you can be sure they would do everything in their power to abide by the laws which preserve as much life as possible."

 _CRASH!_

"Hey!" the bar owner screamed across to the table of 5 rough looking individuals, "YOU OWE THIS BAR A NEW TV!" "Eh put it on my tab," a male boar with a nose-ring said, "What a load of crock that pres is." "Yeah" a slithery voice interjected, "Spiral energy conservation? Just another way for humans to say, 'you can't use it, but we can.'" "What about this agency?" a stuttering yak voiced, "Do you really think they exist?" "If they existed," a female educated them, "they wouldn't be powerful enough to get the drop on what's gonna hit em." "So our guns came in?" a hairy cross between a man and ape asked. "Yes," the woman replied, "Plasma energy assault, the best to bore holes through Earthling scum."

A pile of weapons: handguns, uzis, things that looked like flares. They all poured onto the table from a burlap sack the boar poured out onto the table. Each member at the table examined their weapon of choices carefully. "Yeah" the lady with a slithering voice said, "I can see it now, Earthling scum running as I bust one in their teeth." The half-ape half-man felt a bump from behind him.

"What's yer problem!?" "Sorry, I heard there's some arms dealings here and I thought I'd love to know who's supplying you guys." The man spoke with an inflected Southern accent. The ape-man looked at his face, he saw the black facepaint around his eyes, they trailed down his cheeks, almost to represent a crying face of black tears. "A Solerian eh!?" the yak asked, "You ain't human, but we sure don't like the ones who just bend over for them either."

"I'm not bending over for the humans, I just want information, who's arming you guys to the teeth?" The enemy was being cooperative, a little _too_ cooperative. "As you know Solerian, there's a new game in town, we arming our anti-human brothas to the teeth. Private military corporations are making a killing, literally by ridding entire towns of humans." "And the best part is," the woman said, "The humans have no idea who hit them and what they're facing, it's an all out war they can't win."

"So who the hell did you say you work for?" the boar asked. "GLA," the cowboy proudly said. "Who?" "G-L-A" he spelled it slower. Quick to draw, all five hostile individuals took up arms and aimed it at the cowboy. "Never heard of ya! And we never will."

Just when the five individuals were about to fire, the cowboy whipped his cape off towards the table of five, obscuring their view, but bringing into his view two shiny revolvers. He unholstered them both in less than a split second, spun them around on their triggers, and begun twirling them before he unleashed a flurry of rounds right towards the table. He backed up, flipping over the table he was previously sitting on and then tipping it over to provide himself some cover.

The enemies were wise to do the same to avoid gunfire to the cowboy who got the first draw. "Well idiots!" the ape-man commanded, "we outnumber that stinking human sympathizer. JUST SHOOT HIM!" All five hostiles began to fire at the table which the cowboy had been hiding behind. Back resting on the bottom of the table, the cowboy looks at the hailstorm of bullets which missed the table and ended up on the wall. He let out a smile. "Bad shots," he thought. "Yo, little help here Steel Samurai."

A whoosh of air flew directly across the room, the enemies who all had their arms extended while hiding behind the table felt a cool breeze pass in front of them.

 _SCWING!_

That's all they heard. Their guns suddenly not being able to fire any longer, they kept pulling the trigger, but the audible click they heard with each strike hitting the chamber echoed the room. Nothing was coming out. It was then that all of them noticed, whatever had passed by them just cleaved their firearms in halves. The shocked gangsters took a look at what was left with their eyes gaping open and they're mindsets going into an "Oh shit!" state of shock.

"You have no honor," a noble voiced announced his arrival. The samurai sheathed his sword back. His white and baby blue uniform showed he was at least the cowboy's senior, or maybe he just liked to dress in uniform much more than him. He stared at the cowboy with his small black beady shaped eyes. "Are you okay, Space Cowboy?" The space cowboy peeked his head from behind his cover, making sure the coast was clear. The bar was quiet enough to hear a pin drop, Space Cowboy broke the silence, "WHAT THE HELL NODA, YOU WERE SITTING RIGHT THERE AT THE BAR AND YOU DIDN'T COME TO HELP UNTIL NOW!?"

"WELL IF YOU DIDN'T DRINK MY SAKE AT THE BASE, REZA, I WOULDN'T NEED TO ENJOY EVERY LAST SIP OF THIS DELICIOUS RICE WINE!" The two glared at each other, the tension ready to be cut by the sword of the samurai they called Noda until they heard a cock of a shotgun. "HEY YOU TWO!" the bartender aimed his gun at both of them, "YOU HAVE HELL TO PAY FOR MY BAR YOU LITTLE-" "BUTT OUT BARKEEP!" they both yelled in unison as Noda sliced his shotguns' barrel off and Reza shot two warning shots at his ears which shattered two bottles of...something on the wall. They were professional friends after all, what seemed like a genuine fight between the two ended up being the impetus for banter which lead to the next adventure in this bar. A good old fashioned bar fight.

Two men came rushing at Reza and he cooly flipped over one to feed him to Noda who met the assailant with a foot to the face. Reza took care of his guy by tossing him over his shoulder and promptly sitting down on one of the bar stools, signalling for a drink from a shocked barkeep. "Are you both done messing around?" a voice sounded in both of their earpieces. "Overseer," Reza opened up, "You just darn missed the best darn bar fight ever if I do say so myself." "Well great," Overseer said over the communication line.

Overseer laid back in her seat, getting a glance of the three large giant sized screen monitors on her left, right, and middle. She brushed her long pink strands of hair to the side as they fell over her glasses that she needed to wear in order to see the monitors, and what the hell, she wanted to look smart too. As she looked at the middle monitor, she saw camera feeds of the back alleys of the bar where Reza and Noda started their commotion. "While you guys were busy putzing around, you let Big Time and her boys make a break for it."

Both Reza and Noda looked at each other, slightly annoyed at the other for forgetting the mission, they both then changed their expressions from annoyance, to panic. "SHIT!" they both yelled in unison realizing how much trouble they were going to get in from the Chief. "Sylveria's gonna hog all the action!" "Don't worry," Overseer confirmed, "Like you said, they're on a beeline towards Stealth Ninja, she'll take care of everything."

Blocked corridors, debris, and plenty of neon signs lined the back corridors of the bar. The five gang members ran through with stride through these back alleys. This was their turf after all. But turf or no turf, they've never dealt with her before, they never dealt with a ninja. From behind, two gang members were hit with shurikens to the backs of their thighs, the snake woman and the yak. They could no longer walk. Whoever threw them was an expert at hitting the right arteries to incapacitate them. The three gang members decided to stop and look back at their fallen comrades. They all looked around with the same thought dancing in their head, "Just who the hell did that." Before they could finish their thoughts, she came for them.

Soft, nimble, a prehensile tail, the ninja first went for the two big guys. "A punch to gorilla man's face. Balance self on tail. Kick with hind legs under boar man's chin. Flip yourself, tail rain down on your head little piggy." the swift agile movements of the reptilian looking ninja took center stage to this one sided fight. Even outnumbered two to one, she handled them with ease. That's not to say they didn't fight back, the boar tried to outbox her, delivering as many right hooks as he could, aiming for her bulbous, scaly, skull. The ninja precedes her reputation however, dodging most punches and meeting some head on in order to deliver some strikes to the boar's neck.

The gorilla came next, he tried to smash the ground which she stood, but she simply whisked away. She smacked him with her powerful tail, hard! The gorilla didn't appreciate this move, he was much tougher than a direct tail to the face. She landed swiftly on her feet and proceeded to aim for performing various rapid punches to his chest, trying to find a weak point. The repeated pounding of the gorilla's body made a rhythmic beat to her heartbeat, getting faster as she was desperately searching for a kill switch on the muscular ape who would not go down so easily. He decided he had enough, with both arms he grappled the ninja, squeezing her as hard as possible.

Sylveria was being crushed, but her skin started releasing moisture enough for her clawed hands and arms to slip out of his hold. She struck the gorilla's two temples, dazing him. She felt the screaming and charging of another right behind her. Then her instincts kicked in. She kicked off her tail from the floor to launch herself up. Grabbing the boar by his nose ring, she completely flipped him by pulling up on his nose. She wanted to tear that nose ring off. But the boar went down to the floor first, pansy. With self awareness, she saw the gorilla slowly shake off his daze, she reacted quickly and launched herself to squarely kick him in the face. And now, they were both down. "One got away," Sylveria thought, "Chief's not going to like this."

Overseer stood up as she slammed her palms on the dashboard console. "Team, I don't have visual of the remaining target. She's disappeared into the crowd." "I have visual," a voice responded. "Darry," another voice addressed the overseer, "Gurren Lagann is on standby if civilian casualties are at risk." "Roger that…" Darry reluctantly responded, "Rook, you're up!"

The three professionals caught up as they gave chase from the back alleys, to the busy crowd infested streets of LED and bioluminescent wearing pedestrians. They scanned the crowd while engaging in friendly banter as they chased a woman running through the crowd, throwing whatever unfortunate person in the way of her three chasers. "So Sylveria, it's not like you to let one slip through them slimy fingers o' yours." Sylveria was a woman of few words, looking like a gigantic lizard didn't help trying to socialize with majority of Spiral races who looked human. Her thoughts and actions communicated and conveyed what she needed to say. Slight grunts could be heard when she truly disagreed with something. "Reza's still mad Sylveria," Noda reassured her, "He's the idiot who let them escape in the first place." Reza began protesting loudly. "If it wadn't for Noda hoggin' all the drinks in that bar I'd be sipping that good ol fashioned whiskey." "But you shot it didn't you!?" Noda chided. "WHO ASKED YOU BUN HEAD!?" Reza was right, Noda wore a top bun on his head made up from his large locks of blonde hair. Sylveria let out a smirk that you could see form around the gossamer mask she used to hide her mouth.

The mission was clear however, and they both focused to continue running and catch the perp. The villain herself wasn't going to go down without a fight, she wicked and weave through the civilians and when she felt them get close behind her, she grabbed the first child civilian she could find as she knew she was being followed. There was an opening to her right, she took it, now being chased by four people, her chasers and the child's mother. The child began crying uncontrollably while her chasers backed her into the alley, it was a dead end. Just what they wanted.

"Ok you freaks!" the woman spoke, "Back off unless you want this kid's last sight to be the horrified face of his mother." The frantic mother begged and pleaded for the villainous lady to stop and the would-be heroes to try to save her boy, but all three soldiers just folded their arms, understanding that to win, you need to win as a team, and this particular team had one trump card up their sleeve. The three soldiers turned their backs to the villainess, walking away to clear a view to the terrorist. The mother looked at the soldiers in confusion, "Are you going to save my baby!?" the frantic mother thought.

Suddenly, 50 yards away on a very high building, blinded by a nearby neon sign, a glint of someone's rifle scope was seen by the hostage taker. "Oh no!" she thought. And that was the last thought she would have before getting a direct bullet right in between the eyes. The gunshot resounded in the district, crowds stared at the source of the noise, aviary animals native to Neo Neptune flew into the air. But most of all, the collision of the bullet to the woman's forehead knocked her out cold, not as fatal as it looked from a certain perspective.

The devastated young boy ran to his mother, both mother and son in a warm embrace as the mother looked at the team, mouthing words of gratitude. The team on the ground looked towards the source of the gunshot. "Well done Rook." Reza commented.

Rook read the lips of Reza from her scope, she smirked. She knew it was a good shot, but she was humble. "Venkatians, " an older man with wrinkles approached behind her as she lay prone on the floor, "they look like humans, but their anatomy dictates they have a thick skull, making them impossible to knock out by normal means." The red haired older man wore a military uniform and had a miniature drill around his neck. "But you remembered their anatomy, that's some mighty fine work being your first time in the field and all." The woman got out of the prone position. She quickly disassembled her rifle and packed it away. Her orange, blue, and white biker suit accentuated her curves. She made sure as she got up, to zip up her chest area of her suit so she could cover up her naturally gifted cleavage. She whipped her blonde hair to the side, revealing a set of cold, sharp, killer blue eyes. "Thanks Chief Gimmy." She saluted. "No," Gimmy firmly stated, "Thank you for the prompt execution. Mission accomplished." The Rook smiled in relief as her first mission ended up in success based on her final actions. "Anne Littner…" the man called her attention.

 _"Welcome to the Agency!"_


	3. P2: Maybe He's Just Stressed

**Author's Note:**

Due to the content guidelines of this site, I will need to remove the 17+ version of this story that I previously had posted up on this site. If you are a reader who would prefer to read this chapter uncut and in its' official entirety, please PM me.

Thank you and sorry.

* * *

Prologue 2

In the week leading up to the wedding, Simon and Nia needed their privacy. They took Lagann and themselves to some island that they saw somewhere along their travels and decided to enjoy life to their fullest. The week passed. The wedding passed. Nia felt that something strange should have happened by now, the only strange thing that happened was Boota, a little pig mole who sat besides the cutting board, didn't chomp off the stems of her carrots when she would slice off the ends.

Nia looked at her hand, seeing her green beryl colored ring and wondered whether this was real life, or was it just fantasy? "Easy come...easy go…" she muttered to herself. She smoothly lifted up her cutting board and slid her carrots off into a pot of simmering thick soup. The smell was atrocious, but she knew her Simon would love it. She took one whiff of the stew and she knew it was ready. She took a ladle and served some to Boota in a bowl, leaving it on the floor for him to easily access. She picked out a lunch cloth, wrapped up their lunch, and made her way to the door.

Nia came out of her home, an estate that was front and center looking at Parliament Tower, and walked all to way to meet her driver at the car. "Hail Coco," she sweetly smiled as she got in, "Well met." Old Man Coco scratched his mustache and began driving. Needless to say, he was a terrible driver. He nearly hit multiple pedestrians numerous times, he stopped suddenly at every semaphore, and he turned hard at every turn. His height at the steering wheel clearly was not proportional either as he was too short to see the hood of his own guncar.

But still, Nia smiled on, she loved Old Man Coco despite his flaws. His dedication to her was adorable, to a point where Nia would talk to him on the nights where she would get depressed, even though he wouldn't talk back. The car ride was, a ride to say the least, and busy city life isn't such a sight for Nia to behold. She only wanted to get downtown promptly so she could meet up with her recent husband. The man of her dreams. The leader of the free world. Supreme Commander Simon. She looked out of her window and saw billboards where now the Supreme Commander was a spokesman for everything. Need to sell a watch? Simon is your guy. Need to promote a show? Simon for hire. Need to get your pet out of a tree? Simon can save that too.

Nia smiled at all the attention Simon was getting now and she was ecstatic for him, but she also selfishly wanted him for herself. "Milady," Old Man Coco abruptly stopped the car, "Your destination." Nia stepped out of the car and shut the door softly, she slowly clacked her heels along the pavement as she made her attention known she was coming to everyone in the vicinity.

Everyone knew what those clacking heels meant as Nia walked across the granite floor and up to Simon's office. To the security guard, it was his duty to allow the venerated princess to come in. To Kinon, Simon's secretary, it meant Nia had a lunch appointment. To the young janitor who dreamed of bigger things, seeing the total babe walk by so he could briefly smell her cloudy hair was the highlight of his day.

Nia had lots of thoughts racing in her mind. Even at this age and at this time, she would get nervous when seeing Simon. She was his wife, they were married, it shouldn't be awkward anymore, but it was. Nia put her hand on the door knob and slowly opened it, "Hail fellows, well-" "You cannot be serious Supreme Commander Simon!" a man in a white military suit incredulously overpowered his voice over Nia's greeting. Nia was in awkward shock. What was this all about? Simon and Rossiu turned their attention to Nia walking into an awkward situation. "Advisor Rossiu," Simon signalled towards Nia, "You'd best watch your tone with our guest." Situation awareness hit Rossiu, "Apologies Princess," he then laid a glare into Simon's eyes, "But I think she should hear this too!"

"Hear what?" she piqued her interest. Getting right to the point and not wasting time. "Supreme Commander Simon wishes to send a battalion of Grapearls right in the heart of the Solerian Peace Summit we've scheduled in three months." Nia failed to see the point, Rossiu forgot the slight lack of knowledge on current events to establish a proper opinion, she had been in deep space after all. "There have been rumors that the Solerians have been shadowing their true intentions by calling a peace summit in order to mount an insurrection against humans of Earth. But I don't buy it. Soleria is a planet that was hit by their own Annihilation System. They're world became a desolate, barren, unlivable place. Resources for food, weapons, and water are scarce and the purpose of their meeting is to establish peace, THEY NEED OUR HELP!"

Rossiu pointed his finger, trying to cast blame on the one man that Nia trusts with all her life. "Supreme Commander Simon here, he believes these rumors to be substantiated, he's sending a Grapearl squad in the event of a possible ambush. It doesn't make any sense to rile any further feathers, we've done our research and they're no threat."

"Need I remind you Advisor Rossiu," Simon got out of his chair and stared out his wide panoramic window to view the city below him, "Your reputation and word went down the day you made the choices you did." Rossiu took extreme offense, but he knew he was right, "Be that as it may," he chose his next words carefully, he was already seething, "You're right. You came to the surface, I followed. You defeated the Anti-Spirals, I ran. You married a Princess and I," he thought about Kinon, "I lost her heart. But Supreme Commander, as your advisor, no, as your friend, won't you see it in your heart to please not follow in the footsteps of Lordgenome?"

Nia felt the need to interject here as she felt a slight personal attack here, "Rossiu," she scowled a bit at him, this wasn't going to end well, "I believe in my Simon." She put her hand on her heart. "I believe in him with all my heart and I trust him. He is not my father, and I see no reason why sending a Grapearl squad wouldn't at least provide some type of relief for the possible safety of humanity here."

"Princess," Rossiu scowled back, "With all due respect, you're out of line." That did it. Nia wasn't going to take that anymore. "Rossiu!" she escalated her voice and pointed a finger at him, "By my order which reflects the direct order of Supreme Commander Simon, I hereby relieve you of stealing another minute of my lunch hour with Simon." Well that went better than expected. Typical Nia, a situation could be the most tense, and she'd just slice it with her sweet innocence. Rossiu couldn't help but lighten up a bit. "Hmph," he chuckled, "Thank you Princess. I'll take my leave, we'll discuss later Supreme Commander." With that, Rossiu took his leave.

"Geez what was that about?" Simon asked as he innocently just feigned the responsibility. "I-just -saved-you-from-another-meeting." She said in a singsongy voice. Nia nonchalantly walked over to a buffet table lined against the window wall. She ignored Simon's devilish look on his face as she walked across and she sniffed her hair. "You won't believe my day today," she began to ramble, "I was trying to boil this stew for hours, but Coco kept forgetting to remind me. I was in the garden and planting flowers, come to think about it I had to resow and replant."

It was then all of the sudden, Nia felt a hand on her bare shoulder. "Hm?" "Nia," Simon longingly whispered into her ear as he crept up right behind her, now placing both hands on both sides of her neck and brushing them past her bare shoulders. "Simon?" she blushed as he began to nip the right side of her neck. She enjoyed it, but she knew that what he was trying to do was taboo. "Simon...you're working...there's a window…" She protested for him to stop lightly, but before she knew it, Simon managed to slide her dress off by grabbing the sides of her sleeves and pulling down.

He pulled off her dress and let it drop on the floor. Thank goodness her hair was long enough that it covered the important parts on her chest. Nia blushed uncontrollably due to embarassment. She turned around to face Simon, "Simon, someone can come in anytime, we need to eat lunch, and…" Before she continued her rambling, Simon shushed her lightly with his finger on her lips. "I've told Kinon no more meetings," he gave his first soft kiss on her lips. "As for lunch," he looked at her naked body, as perfect as ever, "I want dessert now!" Simon lip locked with Nia and began to smack lips together, taking his time to ensure he used his entire tongue to explore her mouth.

"I've got him wrapped around my finger..." she thought to herself as Simon's tongue traced the outside of her lips, "...usually I do at least. Do I ever let him get his way? Guess I've been a _little_ selfish." Nia acknowledged. "But who am I to deny the needs of the Supreme Commander?" The Princess gave a silent salute to him as she offered her full submission to him. Nia's mind then transported itself as she recapped her memories she had on the week leading to her wedding.

She recalls the seven days on the island. Living each day as if it was their last, not wasting a moment. Nia felt very spry after coming back, it was weird, she recalled her DNA being damaged during her Anti-Spiral transformation. She heard the doctors say words like, "She'll never be human again," or "It's a wonder she's still alive." So because of this, they never wasted a second. After a whole day of activities to take advantage of this beautiful island, the sun would set on one side of the coast. On the other, the moon would peek itself, two celestial bodies seen at the same time. This romantic sight was enough for them to make love on that very beach. Simon reassured her every night. "You're not going away, not now, _not_ ever." They made as much love possible everyday, as much as they can, and as long as they can.

Nia's thoughts about these tender moments with Simon made her tickled pink. She couldn't live in the past anymore, she had to live for the moment. She spotted a lounger Simon had in the corner of his office. It was a gift from Rossiu, and Simon used it maybe once since coming back. Nia took notice of this, "Let's break it in," she playfully thought.

They made love on the office couch now. Simon was steadying his pace to the consistency of his beating heart.

Nia's mind began to wander, it eventually went to a dark place, the Anti-Spirals. Pain, violation, extreme breakdown, and complete despair; this is what the Anti-Spirals made her feel as they began to tear apart her DNA to the quantum level. Entire patches of her body were missing and she witnessed everything: important organs, circulation points, pain receptor glands, all missing for brief moments due to the Anti-Spiral being performing the worst kind of rape on her. She knew the Anti-Spirals broke her perception that day, her body may be repaired, but her mindset could no longer be recovered.

Anti-Spirals by nature were not in the business of performing sexual acts against Spiral kind, they find that low. But Nia still felt that they violated her: they violated her sacred body, they violated her mind, and to make matters worse, they tried to drain her into their collective conscience. To Nia, this was rape, and she was ashamed of this whenever she thought of Simon still wanting her after this whole ordeal. Simon was the perfect guy for her, he crossed the universe to save her, she only wanted to stay his forever and it was the least she could do.

But still, it was Simon. She looked at him, his sweet face: hardworking, soft, innocent. It eased up her tension. She let her hands wander a bit more like her thoughts. They settled on his shoulders. "These shoulders," she thought, "he's always putting so much of the weight of the world on these shoulders."

Simon kept increasing his pace, as Nia noticed the time for lunch winding down, even though they didn't eat anything, she really wanted to give Simon the last laugh, she loves him after all. Nia was ready, she was going to give her everything to Simon, she wanted one last look at his trusting face, the one that's kept her safe, she briefly glanced.

 _Red circuitry?_

Her fear appearing on her face for a split second. She quickly closed her eyes and looked again. She was seeing things. Her mind was playing tricks on her. She felt absolutely guilty, but she knew that she needed to tell Simon to stop so she could recollect herself and her thoughts. Nia sweetly smiled at Simon with an uncomfortable but loving smile. "Simon…" she softly sighed, "I'm quite okay now… can you please stop?" Simon didn't answer her, instead, he carried on with his actions, making the lovemaking a little more painful on Nia. "Simon, please stop. I love you. But I'm actually not feeling too well."

Simon's face turned dark, his hair shadowing his eyes from all expression for Nia to see. Nia could feel it in the air. This time, Simon was unrelenting, Nia was not prepared or expecting what came next. Simon began to get violent against her body. Nia grew concerned and this time begged as she was no longer having fun, "SIMON PLEASE STOP YOU'RE HURTING ME!"

Nia's brain was scattered, she never felt so confused in her life, tears streamed down her face. There is no worse feeling than having the man you love suddenly become someone else, perhaps even something else. Nia's face frozen in shock. Simon looked at her. "Those eyes," she noticed his cold and expressionless eyes.

"Is he mad at me?" Nia thought, first and foremost. Simon pulled himself off of her and started putting his clothes back on. "Leave," he coldly said. "Don't you have a busy day back home today?" Nia's regret and confusion piled on. "Simon" she apologetically sighed, "I'm sorry…I don't know what came into my mind. I just..."

"It's okay Nia," Simon interrupted, "Sometimes I need to just accept you just aren't in the mood sometimes." Further from the truth, it's true Nia didn't come to visit him at work with the intentions of what they did, but she liked their moments together. She hung her head low, "I'm sorry Simon. I'll go home now."

A visibly broken Nia gathered her clothes and distressingly rushed to put them back on. Her hair wasn't decent, but she figured if she ran fast enough, no one in the hallway would see what she had just been through. It was embarrassing to say the least. Before she left, she turned to look at Simon one last time, already back at the desk reading a memo. "Simon, I liked it. I don't know what came over me. When you come home, I'll have dinner ready again ok?"

Simon turned her direction and gave a fake smile, "Sure." He responded. Then he went back to uncharacteristically look back at his work again. Nia knew whatever was bothering simon, she'd have to bear the responsibility for being partly to blame. As Nia went down the elevator, she once again wondered whether something was wrong with her again. Feeling as alive as she did, why did something feel off with her these past weeks? Nia then thought about Simon, why he would suddenly have needs in the middle of the day, why he would escalate by sending military might before a Peace Summit. She thought and thought again. With no further political clout or knowledge on the situations since coming back, she only drew one conclusion as she made her way back to her limo and looked back at Parliament tower one last time.

"Maybe he's just stressed."


	4. C2: You Break it, You Pay it

Chapter 2

Digging tunnels. It's a skill I learned from this old man I met when I was younger. The old man taught me so I can help aerate the parched soil that we stood on. And the villages need tunnels. This provides the soil air and water tunnel pathways. I hear back in my home of Waterton on Earth, it's helped to provide a connection to the main hub of Kamina City. Waterways have expanded, commerce is flourishing, and Waterton is a village that's turned from some barren wasteland, to a thriving garden tourist attraction. No one pays me with anything there. The old man told me that helping people is a virtue, that human progress is its' own form of payment. But I'm not the old man, the world doesn't operate on charity and give me's. In this world, you have to make it, in order to break it. I intend to break everything now. I've carved my own path in the world. I'm pretty content just living it out like this. I'm just a simple driller, there's no big plan for me, is there?

In a remote jewelry store right on the outskirts of Neo Neptune's Diamond District, everything is closed around this hour. The curfew that the districts employ are fierce, it's meant to ensure that the constant lights that buzz around Neo Neptune come off, to signify that there is a night time to Neo Neptune. That the black skies aren't just a way to say that it's always night in Neo Neptune, there are nights as well, people need to sleep. The Diamond District had its' own circadian rhythm. This weeded out the upper class who would work in the daytime, and the lower class who'd ruin their eyesight at night to clean up the streets in poor lighting conditions.

Within that same store which houses some of the finest collection of diamond jewelry the Diamond District is known for, the windows began to shake. It was because inside, the porcelain tiles on the floor began to rumble. A cluster of 20 x 20 tiles implodes into the earth itself, without the foundation base, these tiles just decided to buckle under their own weight and fall into what seemed like a black tunnel under them. Out of the blackness, two brown cowlicks popped out of the floor. A young man, maybe in his teenage years, stuck his head out. He had his red cape draped over his mouth and his face was stuck with dirt and ash from the tunnel he just dug.

"Jackpot, " he announced as he pulled himself out of the hole. He tried to slick his hair back, running his hands across his hair, his brown cowlicks stuck right back up right above his forehead. He took one of his free hands to pull the red cape he'd used as a makeshift mask off his face. In his other arm, he had a handheld miniature propulsion drill. Latest state of the art in drill technology, blows air so that as you drill, the sediments would clear out so you can see where you're drilling. "Coast is clear guys." As the boy carefully looked around for any other people in the dimly lit store, two other boys came out, one with a mohawk, the other with an afro. The three friends stared in amazement at all the diamond jewelry on display.

"Whoaaaa!" mohawk marvelled. "This is a good haul PeaCoco." The two friends called the caped digger as PeaCoco, a portmanteau of the animal peacock and his nickname. This name in jest was meant to satire the cowlicks which would constantly stand on the top of his head, like a peacock. The boy they referred to as "PeaCoco" would not find this funny however, he tried to rush his friends. "Time to line your pockets boys. This is the motherload, after this, we won't need to do another job for a while."

"But won't somebody miss this?" afro asked. "Nope," PeaCoco responded, "This is Neo Neptune, diamonds literally grow on trees here." He was right, Neo Neptune's primary carbon earth guaranteed that the production of diamonds was much more in abundance here than on the planet Earth, where a majority of humanity comes from. "Besides," he began to think as he was still stuffing jewelry into his bag, "I need this so I can take care of the old man when I get back." PeaCoco seemed genuinely happy and concerned at the same time. Whoever this, old man he referred to, he referred to him with a silent and profound respect. "Sorry old man," he thought to himself, "I know you don't approve of stealing, but I gotta do this."

All three friends continued stuffing their bags and pockets, they didn't notice shadowy figures from around them surrounding the jewelry display cases. A single light turned on and provided spotlight right above them. "Well well well," a voice sneered, "Look what we have here. Some young punks who think they have the right to steal from Big Mama Jama." The three friends looked around, shadows around them with no clear faces. They saw their jewelry which they all wore in abundance, it reflected the one spotlight that the three friends were standing on. Afro and mohawk both ducked and hugged each other tightly, afraid of making the wrong people mad. PeaCoco took point and put his hands up.

"GUYS!" he said in a friendly tone, "Is this your jewelry shop? Wow I'm so sorry, I thought this was my uncle Steven's back from Shouka district. Oh man, what a big mistake I made, these two idiots following me probably mixed up the underground tunnel directions. Ain't that right guys?" No response. "Guys!?" PeaCoco looked back and saw two missing outlines of people who should have been there. He then saw the porcelain tiles he let cave into the floor magically seem to appear back on the surface, covering up the exit hole he was going to use. The patch up job was poorly done, but one thing's for sure, PeaCoco's escape plan was shot.

He annoyingly looked at the hole, in complete and utter humiliation as he felt he just got punked. "Looks like your boys decided to leave you." PeaCoco rubbed the back of his head and began rambling, "Well here's the thing, they aren't really my friends they're more like, my mother's auntie's sister's nephew's cousin's former roommates from another mother and-" "SHUT UP!" Before he knew it, guns from all different directions pointed at the man in the center of the room. "Um guys!? Can't we talk a little more?" PeaCoco pleaded.

"Oh you've talked quite a bit," a man threatened, "Human scum, you gonna die here, less humans there be on this planet, and you won't even make the news. Big Mama won't even wanna know your name fool." PeaCoco's desperation became apparent. He had been in tough situations before, but this one took the cake due to the unexpected visitors. He'd certainly never been pointed a gun at before. He looked down at his feet, he saw black dirt, his mind began gearing and working. He had an idea.

"Gentlemen," he began to talk, "I think we got off on the wrong foot. My name is Copernicus, friends call me Coco." He lifted up his giant forearm mounted drill. "Look guys, I'm a driller, that's what I do, I just use this puppy to make a living by drilling tunnels and the like. Would you like to see this work?" The shadowy figures leered their eyes. "Just what in the world is your game you punk?" Coco tweaked a couple of nozzles on his arm drill and pointed it directly at the floor. "Like you see, this drill has the latest AIR PROPULSION!" Suddenly, a quick flick of a trigger on his hand unleashed a huge gust of air. It caused the dirt which Coco left behind to kick up a ringed dust storm around him and temporarily blind his assailants. "SHIT SHIT!" Coco thought as he started dashing wildly towards what seemed like the back door. The shadowy figures coughed away the dust getting into their lungs and looked around. "Where da hell did he go!?" The men looked around until they found a gigantic hole which could fit a crouching person that led outside. "Find him." One of the men said.

The lack of neon lights really hindered Coco's sense of direction, he didn't know which alley he was turning on or where he was going to go next. "Oh please!" he began to beg to the sky, "I don't care what I'm going to have to do after this, I'll clean toilets, I'll cook for the old man every day, I'll go rescue a cat out the tree," he stopped to think about the last one, "Anything just so I can escape with this one haul." As he continued to run, he made his way into one alley where he noticed a door, it was worth a shot. He knocked repeatedly, no one answered. As he heard the quickly approaching footsteps behind him, he decided to simply kick the door at the knob to provide the quickest entry way. He got in.

Coco quickly slammed the door, finding some chair he quickly shoved it under the knob of the door and slowly backed away from the door as he heard pounding on the other side. Coco let out a sigh of relief, "Well I say that was well worth it." Just then, a large brown skinned woman appeared from behind Coco. Well dressed in a white suit, her main articles of clothing she identified with were a pair of black shades and a necklace with a sign of currency. "I'm Big Mama Jama," the giant figure said, "That's some interesting looking jewelry." All Coco could do was just feel defeated, "Oh, what the f-"

SMACK!

Coco was living large. There he was, in the rainbow colored tunnel, drilling, drilling, and drilling away with his arm dril. The dirt turning into diamonds as he drilled into the earth. Coco's eyes lit up and turned into currency symbols as he began drilling harder. Coco then drilled above his head and the diamonds further showered onto his head. "Why do diamonds feel so wet?" he asked a little surprised, but nonetheless happy, "Who knew diamonds could feel so refreshing." He spit out some of the tiny diamonds that went into his mouth. Coco then reached the surface.

 _DIAMONDS EVERYWHERE_

Out in this floral field where the flowers grew diamonds and the floor was lined with diamonds and the sky was lit up with a rainbow with the light refracting off the diamond clouds. Coco couldn't help but feel overwhelmed and just fell supine into the soft diamond dirt ground. "DIAMONDS!" he sang along in total heaven. Coco spread his arms and legs from his supine position and begun to wave his arms and legs, making a diamond angel. The gigantic diamond clouds then began to float down to him. "Come to me my gigantic beauty!" As Coco's face salivated at the floating diamonds, the first diamond reached his chest. "OOF!" It weighed literally a ton. It then slid off his chest and disappeared into nothingness. "Weird," that's all Coco can think. More diamonds were raining down from the clouds. Coco gaped his mouth open to accept all the incoming glittery bliss. "DIAMONDS!" Suddenly, a bunch of diamonds from the sky fell down. This time making other sounds as they hit him in the chest and stomach. "OOF!" "POOM!" "POW!"

 _KLOK!_

Coco woke up, a single light on him as he hung loosely from a rope hanging him from one of the pipes suspended on the ceiling. His hair and face wet, dripping with water as he was splashed repeatedly by his captors. "So you do wake up." A man with brass knuckles commented. "Good morning sunshine."

 _BAM!_

He let out a punch to Coco's gut. Coco felt extreme soreness in the punch, spitting out some saliva out of his mouth. Quite honestly it was disgusting, but at least he could now speak. "Hey can't we talk about this?"

 _SOCK!_

"We done talked enough," the man said adjusting his knuckles as they collided with Coco's face, "You steal from the boss, you get pinched. One less human is better for the galaxy anyways." The brass knuckles man pulled out a handgun and pointed it directly at Coco's face. "Easy big fella," a voice bellowed from behind the man with brass knuckles, "Can't you see we have a guest today?" The powerful voice stepped out into the light and stood side by side to the man with the brass knuckles. "So Big Mama," a rough military man said. He had a buzzcut, wore a camouflage jacket unbuttoned to show off his physique. His white tank top fit snugly on his defined olive skinned body, "This is how you welcome me to your warehouse? With you about to kill some kid?"

"Easy," Big Mama responded while smacking her lips, "They don't call me Big Mama Jama for nothing. This boy here done try to steal mai precious diamonds, and I ain't having none of that. So you can understand that I am pretty pissed that I don't respect this kind of disrespect." Coco grew a little desperate, he just died, twice. "Hey Big Mama? Can I call you Big Mama?" Big Mama Jama had an expression of annoyance on her face, "Great! So here's the deal, I'm sorry I stole your diamonds, but I just needed one big score. You see, my old man lives on Earth, see that's where I'm from, and every year he gets ready for this festival, you know it's a really popular one. He's getting up there in age and I just want to make sure he sits on a nice goose egg so we can all take it easy. I'm sure one diamond could do right?"

Big Mama looked at him with contempt. "No? Well that's a shame Big Mama, so I think you win this round. Those darn diamonds oh you, I'll get you next time. So like let me go please?" Coco tried to bargain for his life. "Kill him." It didn't work. Coco had his eyes gaping wide open, "Is this how I die?" he questioned. Guns from many men already affixed on him.

 _"WAIT!"_

The military man commanded. He scanned the room and found an arm drill on the table next to where the brass knuckles man would sit during his breaks. "That your drill?" He asked the captive. "Last I checked," he replied. The man's face lit up. He stroked his stubble with his index and thumb for a bit as he pondered.

"My name is Lieutenant Scourge," he said in a coarse, but welcoming voice, "Don't associate me with these criminals, but they have something I need." Big Mama took offense, "Scourge," she pointed her finger at him, "If you think we gonna take some punk boy thief on the heist, you gotta another thing coming." Scourge, not intimidated by her attitude snapped back. "The Colonel is counting on me to finish the job...with or without you." His tone began to threaten to walk out, leaving Big Mama and her crew without any business.

"Well ain't that karma," Big Mama sighed as she conceded, Coco didn't follow what was going on. "I run guns, and the minute someone wants something better than what I have to offer, they rope me in with some punk kid with a drill." She inched her way closer to Coco. "Listen here sonny," she began to scold, "I don't tolerate anyone trying to boost Big Mama, but you got something we could use." "My drill?" he thought. "Yes your drill." she read his mind.

"The plan is, there is this pesky little building we can't seem to get into from the front door," she ran her huge gigantic finger along the side of Coco's cheek, it was quite disgusting really. "So we need to be smart and get a nice little back door if you know what I'm saying." There are two things in Coco's vocabulary he knew very well, the first was heist, the second was money. With the prospect of the heist but no promise of money, Coco only had one thing to ask. "If I refuse?" Lt. Scourge calmly stroked his green hair back. "Then I won't stop these goons from turning you into swiss cheese." Point taken.

Coco looked at both Big Mama and Scourge with defeated and agreeable eyes. Yes he was a thief, but he only liked to steal from those who knowingly deserved it and he only took as much as he needed, now that he's helping the enemy, he didn't know quite how to react to this turn of events. "I guess I have no choice…" he disappointedly announced. Big Mama waved her finger at him, clicking her tongue as she bent down lower eye to eye to Coco to tell him one last thing. "I sure don't think you gonna disappoint me. After all, we have a saying in my crew, especially one for cocky punks like you."

 _You break it, you pay it!_


	5. C3: Don't Ask, Don't Tell

Chapter 3

 _Discrete Location, Neo Neptune (no pictures please)_

All the architecture on Neo Neptune looks rather similar. All storefronts along one side of the reflected street looked like something out of a story book. Anne Littner read such story books as a child with her mother and father. Something about faraway lands called "San Francisco" or "Brooklyn." That's what they looked like to Anne, the streets of "San Francisco" and "Brooklyn." Entire storefronts, houses, and offices all cramped together in multistory dark brick buildings. Steps would lead up to the doors of the buildings. Each building was very narrow, probably no more than 40 feet across the front.

The only thing that truly made these buildings stick out, was the neon signs. Their light buzzing would draw the attention of various Neptunian insects that behaved much like Earth insects, they followed the soft fluorescent sound, and promptly got zapped for it. If we peek in a discrete building's window, we can see this ordinary building is anything but. It houses some of the finest trained members in the galaxy. Anne Littner stood across from a large brown oak desk with Chief Gimmy and the Overseer - Darry. Arms behind her back, she was following the lead of her senior agents who'd stood by her side in the same pose. "Great work team." Gimmy sternly said. "Yes Chief!" they saluted in unison.

Anne was in the center. "Chief," she saluted with her right hand, "I'm very honored to be working alongside the revered Chief Gimmy and Inspector Darry. I look forward to numerous field missions in the very near future." "And you will," Darry reassured her, "Ever since I told Gimmy about your recent Galaxy Shooters Cup those many years ago, we knew we struck gold that day."

And struck gold they did. Three years prior to the Galactic Spiral Peace Conference, President Rossiu and his cabinet understood that like all governments, they could not always run with military might. The other Spiral Races would see this as a threat, that by flexing their technological muscles, they would establish themselves as the controlling race. It is through this seed of an idea that President Rossiu signed a classified executive order to form an Agency. One that would operate in the shadows for covert and high risk recon missions. Many of the office thought of names for the Agency, Gimmy and Darry only thought of one.

"The Gurren Lagann Agency!"

"It wasn't very long ago that we were formed in secrecy all those years ago. It was much harder recruiting you bozos throughout the galaxies," Gimmy joked. "Aw chief," Reza blushed, "You're too kind." The tension broke and now all six professionals in the room began to banter and joke, ignoring all military code and etiquette. Reza rested his hands around Anne's shoulders, ignoring all personal space. "Aw Rook," he smiled at her as he pulled her in closer with his arm. He threw his hand up and waved it across the air, letting Anne focus on the hand. "Galactic Badass Sniper, The Rook, ANNE LITTNER!" he announced.

Anne blushed and let out an elated smile as the rest of her teammates patted her on the back. Anne was normally cold and callous, in normal day situations, she kept a stern face and strutted with her chest out. The boys in the academy liked this, as her cleavage would always make them blush as she walked around. It's not everyday that a female, top of her class in the academy, would be a total smoking hot blonde babe. It was probably due to her mother's genetics. "Kiyoh," Darry snapped her out of her camaraderie with her new team, "Your mother Kiyoh and Dayakka, have you talked to them recently?"

Anne had a soft spot for two things in the universe so far. First, her team, she was making fast friends with them and immediately upon joining, she respected all the members. Secondly, her parents, who gave her to motivation and drive to achieve anything she wanted to. She graduated top of her class at the first graduating Gurren Lagann Agency Academy. "Yes," she replied, "I talked to mom and dad every week when I was at the academy, there were P-Comms always around the Marmota."

The training facility, Marmota, a battleship class Gunmen that would take an 8 year journey through space to reach Gurren Lagann Agency's home base, the planet of Neo Neptune. This state of the art facility was meant to be an academy cruise ship of sorts. The facility was equipped with state of the art training. Simulated sparring arenas for Gunmen, Grapearl, and ground fighting. Shooting ranges that stretched more than the eye can see. Classrooms that would teach the universe around them - because you never knew when that knowledge would help. When Anne referred to the P-Comms, she was referring to the Perception Communication Network. A quantum speed of light network to link people together across the universe in real-time. She spoke to her parents every week like this.

"The difficult part has been getting you out of Dayakka and Kiyoh's arms the day you went to the academy," Darry reminisced, "I know how Kiyoh and Dayakka would feel. Their little girl, training for 8 years on a space boat, going on dangerous missions that they can't know about." Darry took a look at Anne and envied her youthful appearance, "But look on the bright side," she scanned Anne from head to toe. "Space's gravity has been mighty kind to the aging process." Yes, the Perception Teleportation Transit was instantaneous, it got people from one end to the universe at faster than light speed, but if Anne reached Neo Neptune and had no training, then what?

Anne thought about it for a second as she looked at the reflection in the mirror. "Guess you can count that I still act like a 17 year old too," She thought. "Guess that's the price I pay, I'm 25 years old this year, but my body hasn't aged a bit. And for 8 years, I lived, breathed, and ate my training regiment. Is reintegrating me back into society going to make me normal again or something?" Anne thought a lot in her head, but her team, and friends had other plans.

"Drinking time!" Reza announced. Noda, Sylveria, and Gimmy pumped their fist. Darry looked at Gimmy with a glare, he wasn't supposed to drink, he could feel the unease from his twin sister bore right into him. "Ahem," Darry bossed, "I think we still have other matters to attend to." Gimmy just then remembered the special "assignment" for Anne. "Ah yes," Gimmy cleared his throat, "Team, you guys are free to go, except you Anne." The rest of the teammates left the room with sly smiles on their face. Anne had a smile for already being trusted for more assignments, but she didn't know the mission.

She was a little jealous her team got to go out and have a drink, this would have been a perfect time to reconnect with Noda, they knew each other as kids. Reza and Sylveria were strangers as they came from different planets, but being one of the only other female field agents on the team, Sylveria and her hit it off, even though the giant lizard woman didn't speak much. Reza on the other hand shared a connection because both of them were firearm users, Reza apparently has a thing for firearms.

"If you're wondering why we won't let you go drinking," Darry started, "It's because Kiyoh specifically told me, 'As long as that girl still looks 17, there is no way she's going into ANY bars.'" Anne inside felt abashed. "After all this time," she thought, "You still treat me like a kid?" But that wasn't important right now, she was curious, there was this "special assignment" that the two leaders mentioned, Anne was always on board for more field work. "I am ready Chief Gimmy, Inspector Darry," she said respectfully. "Whatever the assignment may be, I'm ready to carry it out 100%. Although I do admit." She hesitated. "The team is out having a good time and it's just going to be me with 'ol Lady Luck." She patted her rifle, signalling that's what she called her gun, Lady Luck. "What could the assignment be that you guys have the confidence that I can handle it on my own?" Both Gimmy and Darry smiled.

GUARD DUTY!

"Are you serious!?" Anne flailed her arms wildly. She was transported somewhere derelict. Not remote, but she was in front of, what looked like an old office building. The buildings neon signs have long been non-operational, the foundation and walls cracked along, and the five story building had so many windows that have been filthy for what seemed like decades. "What exactly am I guarding here!?"

"Don't ask, don't tell." Gimmy's voice spoke in her head. She got angry at this thought of him keeping her in the dark. "Mom and dad put you up to this, is that it?" She thought all the possibilities of why she was assigned such a task. It wasn't as if she was very far away from the main office, she was probably two streets down. Away from civilization to be declared derelict, but close enough that the team could easily go into this building should the need arise. Anne sat close by the rusted metal door main entrance of the building, resting her rifle against her shoulder. Eight years on board the Marmota. Eight years of training. Eight years of looking 17 throughout. All just so that she could plant her butt on the concrete floor and rest her back against the uncomfortable ridges of the building exterior. "Guess this is going to be a boring night."

"HERE!" Big Mama stuck a knife into a large city map blueprint. The paper was yellowed, it was an old map. "This here, is the place we need to get into." "What in there?" Coco asked. "Don't ask, don't tell." Patience was wearing thin on Lieutenant Scourge who very much didn't enjoy sitting around. "We've wasted enough time here boy, your job is clear." Scourge slammed his fist on the table and pointed at the knife which pointed to a large office building outline. "You need to break into here, from the underground. You check out the coast is clear, PROPERLY this time." Coco rubbed the back of his head in embarrassment, but Scourge wasn't his friend to joke around. "Once it's clear, you open the doors so we can get our trucks in, and we get out. Failure to do any of this results in me personally coming over and taking you out of your misery."

Coco wasn't stupid, he looked at Lieutenant Scourge, he was a man twice, maybe even three times his size in muscle mass easily. "Alright then," Coco agreed, "Then I guess I should get started." Coco covered up his face with his red cape, he brought out his drill and aimed down inside the warehouse they were in. Big Mama waved her finger, "None of your drilling nonsense in here, you'll ruin the floor." "Then how do I?" "Latrine!" Big Mama snapped immediately back, "Go outside in the back. NOW!"

"Oh this is disgusting!" Coco thought aloud as he was sifting through a tunnel that ran perpendicular to the outhouse latrine the gangsters used. He was prone, crawling around, nose depp and sloshing through who knows what. "Need to find….soil!" he tried to hold his breath as long as he could, but the smell was pungent. When he couldn't stand it anymore, he aimed his drill in another direction and began drilling. "Just remember Coco," he assured himself, "Old man taught you, the only way to go...is forward." He struggled to think, it smelled awful in that tunnel. "And if there is no path, carve it down yourself."

'Hear the dirt, hear the soil'. 'Go this way' it will say. 'Go that way'. 'The dirt is softer here'. These thoughts resonated in Coco's head as he continued drilling. By no means was digging tunnels a more manageable way to travel, but it was Coco's way. He learned long ago that the quickest path is not always a straight line, but the path that the earth guides you towards, the path you make yourself. Directions were fuzzy for people who normally took to the tunnels, but for Coco, it was his only map. The dirt and earth told him how to reach his destination and how to get there. He would hear noises, signs of electrical buzzing, signs of water pressure, each distinct sound would drive him to make the appropriate path choice to find what he was looking for.

And find it he did. Coco looked up, began drilling right away, and before he knew it, a hole appeared above him. He peeked his head out, "I guess this is the place." It was very cluttered. He looked around, old gunmen, lots of crates, tarps over things hanging off the ceiling. The building had an open floor plan. Other than the catwalks that lined the far ends of the walls, everything you needed to see in this building was out in the open. It's no wonder this building is deserted, who would suspect a derelict office building to house what seems like an endless supply of weaponry for some type of organization?

Coco walked cautiously around the building, tiptoeing as he pulled off his cape off his mouth now that he was out of the tunnel. He saw the loading doors, he would open them after he made sure the coast is clear. Then and only then would the gangsters let him go and he could continue living the poor, carefree life that he always wanted to. He checked carefully this time, behind every crate, behind every tarp, but when he reached the center of the room, he saw something. A red gigantic combined gunmen, it's face was distinctive, it's chest bore what looked like dark sunglasses. "Gurren Lagann!?" It's reputation is well known. "This is Gurren Lagann!" he excitedly jumped, "This is the REAL GURREN LAGANN!"

Coco saw Gurren Laganns and Grapearl units fly into the sky when he was younger. On those silent days when he scavenged for cocowalnuts, he would bring the only thing he had in his possession, a drill, and crack them open as he drank the delicious cocowalnut juice while watching the mecha fly in spiral formation in the night sky. He always wanted to go to the stars, and with the Perception Teleportation Transit, he did so, but it was expensive. He wanted to pilot a Gurren Lagann, a Grapearl, he wanted to be one with the stars. But now he was a thief. He had dreams of flying high into space, but the reality was, he was a thief. The thought discouraged him a bit, but he focused and began to question, "If this is Gurren Lagann, what is this pl-"

Ping…

Coco heard what seemed like glimmer off a very shiny object, his instincts dictated him to duck. BLAM! He was right, the first shot was from an armor piercing electric pulse rifle aimed at him. He was unaware how close he came to becoming blood and guts. The bullet loudly ricocheted off the hard cement floor. "That was a warning shot," the shooter spoke, "I thought this was going to be a boring night, a boring assignment." The woman's face reflected off the bright moonlight that beamed its' way into the compound. Coco got a good look, she flicked her hair back, revealing her clean young face. It sparkled white in Coco's eyes. Thankfully, the woman had her curvaceous biker bodysuit zipped up to not show off too much of her figure.

Coco nervously stumbled on his words as he spoke. He had literally never spoken to any decent looking girl who would engage in any sort of social interaction with him. It was rather embarrassing actually. Coco back at the village would either follow his old man around, or continue drilling tunnels. When he got out, it was usually dark and all the girls had usually gone in. This would be his first experience with one, the situation was rather awkward. "H-H-H-Hey," he nervously stumbled, "Listen, you're a girl and-"

"WHAT'S THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN!?"

"Well I just, my old man says to like never fight girls and-" "Oh," she trained her sights next on Coco's lower extremities, "So you're one of THOSE kind of men eh?" She cocked her bolt of her rifle back. "How about I even the odds and make you a girl too!?" Anne locked onto her sights with her steely cold eyes and the ignition in her pulse rifle sparked another armor piercing bullet his way. In a panic, Coco nervously ducked, and instead of being that other word that ends in ducked, he ended up falling in luck. His arm drill was at the perfect height and material that it once again ricocheted another bullet off of Anne Littner's rifle, and somehow found its' way lodged into the ignition system of her electrical rifle.

Anne flicked her eyes open. Surprise hit her when she realized that this dirty punk decided to break and enter, chastise her equality as a woman in the battlefield, and finally he did the one thing no one else managed to do: he dodged her bullet and he broke her rifle. Anne was furious.

"Ok you turd stinker," she insulted as the wind blew to her direction. Coco realizing that he was just through a septic system blushed uncontrollably at leaving such a terrible impression with the woman. "I swear, I was just going through the septic system." "Are you a Dungian mixed breed of some sort?" Coco scratched his head. "Beetle-like animal, from the planet Tropicus, they stink like you and look ugly to boot." "HEY!" Coco teared up a bit, "GIRLS ARE SO MEAN!?" he thought to himself. "Doesn't matter what you are, rifle or no rifle, you're going down."

Anne jumped from the second floor catwalk. Coco looked at her land perfectly. He nervously gritted his teeth as he saw her cold look rush up to him. Right hook to his cheek on his face. It hurt, she followed up with another left hook to set him upright, he ate it once again on his other cheek. She delivered a straight kick directly to his solar plexus, he grunted as the impact pushed him back. "Please stop," he begged as he adjusted some propulsors on his arm drill and aimed it at her. "PLEASE STOP!" He shot the air directly at her, the pressure was high, it blew Anne to the far wall, where her back collided with a crate. The impact of the crate gave one little surprise as Anne's cleavage popped right open.

PWHOOSH!

Coco's nose shot up blood into the air at the sight of her pressed together chest. He fainted briefly as she shook her head from the impact. There was only one thing Anne could conclude. "He's good," she seriously assessed, "Who is he working for? The Anti-Human Revolution? A local gang? A PMC? Who? In any case, I can't risk failing this mission, I know it was Chief and Inspector's way of babying me, but he's become a serious threat. I'm going to call backup."

"Chief," she pressed her inner earpiece, "I need backup, problem at the compound." "Roger that!" Gimmy responded. "You can't escape," she told Coco, "My team is coming, and either you turn yourself in, or you just let me beat you senseless so you CAN go in." "Please," Coco begged, "I'm really not looking for a fight, some gangsters they're forci-" "SHUT UP!" Anne impulsively snapped, "You're going down, AHHHHH!" Anne charged head on towards him, bent over and a fist above her head, feeling the energy build up as she charged it while she was running.

Coco suddenly saw it all in slow motion, he turned around quickly and ran the other direction, the cape inadvertently whipping up as the air picked it up. Anne kept rushing in, "Wearing capes? Bad move." Anne caught up with Coco, using her free hand, she grabbed his cape...but he forgot to fasten it over his neck, making Anne tear the cape right off and drape over her, blinding her from seeing anything and smelling the remnants of sewage on his cape. "It reeks," she thought as she turned green. Concerned, Coco turned around and accidentally used his wrong arm to catch the mummified Anne, his drill arm. In a panic, not seeing anything, Anne tried to grab the first thing she could for support, but ended up pressing a button on his arm drill. The drill got caught on the cape and spun Anne around laterally. She was literally in a spin cycle under the sheets. The combination of a shit infested cape, a spin cycle, and Anne's motion sickness were enough to make her change many colors. In a quick frantic search for the manual override kill switch to his arm drill, Coco pressed it. The momentum from Anne's spinning and the sudden stop of motion tossed her off like a rag doll.

Anne skidded on the concrete floor. Her skin avoided major scrapes due to her specially made biker suit - made of extremely fibrous material that could resist many high impact scrapes and bumps. Coco knew the calvary would arrive soon, he heard it, he frantically grabbed his cape and began to shimmy himself into the hole where he drilled out of. Before he left, he took one last look. The sleeping beauty, Anne Littner, lay on the floor face down, visibly knocked out. His conflicted head and heart fighting as they decided what the most moral thing to do would be. He dipped his head down, then quickly changed his mind and brought his head back up. "Who am I kidding?" he chided himself as he walked over to the unconscious body of Anne, "Hey...hey…" he flipped her around and began shaking her. "Are you okay!? HEY!" He yelled louder to bring her back to the land of consciousness.

Anne slowly peered her eyes open, twitching her lips as she woke up and tried to assess what just happened. "Oh man," Coco blushed at her radiant face, "She's way too pretty to be a soldier. Just who is she?" Anne affixed her dazed eyes on Coco, not quite getting the smell of feces out of her nose. Her vision cleared up as she looked at the young faced, pointy chinned, brown cowlick hair spewing thief. "He's not a Dungian," she thought to herself, "Human, he looks human, he reminds me of someone. But who?"

"URK!" Coco placed his hand over his left side of his neck. He pulled out a dart. "Night night," he drooled as he fell face first. Sylveria's anesthetic poison darts struck him as she, Noda, and Reza knelt down close to Anne. "You okay Rook?" Noda asked. "Yeah." she replied, not wanting to say anymore. "Just what the hell happened over here?" Reza looked around at broken crates, a broken rifle, and lots of debris everywhere. Anne looked sternly at the sleeping Coco, still drooling in his sleep.

"Don't ask, don't tell."


	6. C4: This Night Can't Get Any Worse

Chapter 4

The team had a long night. Chief Gimmy called a meeting with the team sans Anne, she was recovering from the mild concussion she received earlier when trying to stop an unknown assailant at the warehouse. "While you guys were out partying. Overseer figured out some connections to the recent mission you guys did." They were in the briefing room, a room that housed one gigantic wall with a holographic monitor that would display images in 3 dimensions. Darry pulled up a dossier of a large brown woman who wore shades. "Big Mama Jama," she introduced, "Is the most notorious gunrunner around these parts. Word has it she's been supplying local gangs, private military corporations, even some religious cult the means to acquire weapons that are especially fatal to humans."

Don't get us wrong, most weaponry in the history of weapons was very effective against humans, but the weapons supplied by gunrunners like Big Mama particularly targeted the unique biology of human DNA. Some guns were weapons that would shoot toxins specifically foreign to human immune systems, causing instant vaporization of the victim. The Agency and Earth worked hard to prevent such dangerous weaponry from being mass produced and distributed.

"We know of our enemy now," Chief Gimmy spoke, "But we have no solid leads. We need to stage some form of information gathering." "Hey Chief," Reza called out. Gimmy listened to the Space Cowboy. "What about that punk kid we just caught?" "What about him?" Gimmy asked. "Well, first and foremost he was in OUR weapons store. Anne told us he kept trying to tell her he was being strong armed by someone, and finally he just looks shady." Pot calling the kettle black. Reza looked just as shady, if not more so than everyone on the team, combined. "Well," Darry added, "Assuming Anne and him are getting along swimmingly down in the cells. Maybe we should pay a visit and see what she's found out."

"...Guard duty again…"

That's what Anne thought as she sat on a stool across from a single cell. The cell held none other than the up and coming thief extraordinaire, Copernicus AKA Coco AKA PeaCoco. We're just kidding he's a nobody.

Coco attempted to break the ice. "So can I ask, what's your name?" "No." She impulsively replied. "What hobbies do you like?" "No." "Do you have a boyfriend?" "Don't you ever shut up?" Anne annoyingly snapped. "Listen blondie, I'm not a huge fan about this predicament right now. And seriously, I like...really don't belong here. My old man expects me back on home anytime now. He'll be worried sick about me." Coco was expecting some sympathy, he got none. "Should have thought about it right before you decided to break into our storeroom." Coco exasperated threw his hands past the bars of the jail cell showing his palms. "Look it wasn't me. I told you I'm being strong armed by some super shady gang." Anne's ears perked up, interested, but not really. "Oh yeah? Is that a fact?" she teased, "Well you should have stuck to a legit daytime job."

"I can't, you know along this entire galaxy, no one wants a driller anymore. I don't get it. You think there'd be one world that's as sandy and earthy as good old planet Earth." Anne stopped to listen inquisitively. "You're from Earth?" Just then, the rest of the team came through the door. "Hey Anne," Noda called, "We're needed for recon. Figured with your scope you can help us find the target better." "Finally some action," Anne thought to herself, "What's the target?" "Calls herself Big Mama Jama," Reza answered. Coco's ears shot up, he desperately ran to the bars and clutched them. "Wait!" he called their attention, "I know that name. That's the one who made me break into your guys' building."

"First of all," Anne cut him off, "YOU chose to break into our building, nobody strong armed you to do that." Coco clutched his head of hair, "THEY WE'RE GONNA KILL ME!" "Would that really have been a necessarily bad thing?" Anne snapped. "Oh come on now," he said with exaggerated tears streaming down his face, "Was that so necessary to say?" Noda's mind lit up, "Hey kid. Do you have any idea where this, 'Big Mama' may be?" Coco smiled and nodded his head. "Oh yeah, dug a tunnel directly from her warehouse to yours, I know the tunnels so I can bring you guys to the right building." Noda looked at his team for approval. Reza nodded. Sylveria nodded. He then looked at Anne, already with a disapproving look on her face. "Uh uh, no way, please don't-" "Rook!" Gimmy called out as he stepped through the door, "Steel Samurai has a point. He's the only lead we have right now for finding Big Mama."

Anne grew more irate by the second. There were two reasons she was frustrated. Firstly, she got beat pretty bad by him in both armed and unarmed combat, even though she unknowingly knew this was a fluke. Secondly, she still didn't trust the fact that he was a thief. "With all due respect," Anne clenched her fist and gritted her teeth, "We don't know what this stink breath is capable of." "Hey-" "CAN IT!" she cut him off as he took offense, "Chief we can't even trust him how do we know he won't just leave the moment he gets into a tunnel?"

"Um...excuse me…" Coco raised his hand politely behind the bars, "I can tell you that thieves have moral codes too ya know." Sylveria, Noda, and Reza looked at him as if he was facetious. "No you're right," Gimmy finally addressed the young thief. He then let out a soft, sly smile. Coco didn't like where this was going.

So they strapped a bomb on him.

"A BOMB!?" "Not just a bomb," Darry pointed her finger at him, "BUT A PROXIMITY DETONATED BOMB AT THAT!" Darry was so excited. She wasn't normally a pyromaniac, but the thought of a criminal being in fear simply made her squeal. Her peer and subordinates simply shuddered at the sight of an overly zealous former field agent. Darry was one of the first members of the Gurren Lagann Agency, but due to extenuating circumstances and a need for a chief strategist, she not only had the technical know how, but also the chops to pull it off successfully. There were times that Darry would miss being on the field, but these past years have been very fruitful to her. She was learning a lot about computer systems to get better at her role, she would exercise, and actually began eating healthier because she had the luxury of lunch breaks. It was with her newfound knowledge and role, that she crafted a specialized bomb jacket that she could quickly strap on criminals and keep a proximity alert on them to not lose the target. And now it was on their esteemed guest and criminal, Coco the Driller.

Gimmy smiled as he cooly leaned against the bars, looking at a nervous and profusely sweating Coco. "So here's the deal Mr. Driller." The team and the audience looked at Gimmy and winced, possibly at the threats of a lawsuit, "We're sending you into those tunnels, you're going to find the warehouse where they are. You scope it out, tell us that they're there, and my team should take care of the rest." Coco, still nervous, looked around his jacket. "Don't even think about trying to remove this jacket," Darry stated, "Try to disarm it, it'll blow. Try to tear it off, it'll blow. Get too far, it'll blow." The nervous teen was about to tear his hair out as he began dropping bullets of sweat on his face. "Ok, just this one thing, this one thing and you'll take it off right!?" "Oh we promise pardner," Reza replied with a thumbs up, "Course don't forget, I'm a former outlaw myself, so take my word for what it is." He gave a creepy smile. Coco collapsed.

"Ok guys," Anne called all to attention, "Let's get this over with." Her superhuman strength grabbed a fainted Coco's cape and began dragging him out of the room. "Come on team, let's try to resolve this before curfew." Gimmy and Darry smiled at the young upstarts take action into their own hands. Darry looked at Anne walk away, smiling as she recalled a simpler time when the young girl was a young girl. When she needed the protection of her parents to see the future she was living in now. Darry turned her attention to Gimmy. She looked at Gimmy a little more. The pride he exhibited on his face radiant and beaming as he stared at the door where his team walked out of. She silently played with her ring finger on her right hand, a band clearly visible as she continued to twirl it around her finger. "Gimmy…" Darry broke the silence. Gimmy turned to give his sister some attention, "There's something we need to talk about, privately."

The open air of the back balcony was particularly beautiful. You could see the stars even from the black night sky of Neo Neptune. The weather was calm and cool, it was like Earth at night in every which way, Darry leaned against the balcony rail with Gimmy attentively listening. "We've certainly come a long way Gimmy." Gimmy nodded his head in agreement, "Gurren Lagann Agency has only been in full operation for 5 years, but our team has achieved so much in that little time."

Gimmy remembered those beginning days of the agency, before even peace conferences and members. It was just Darry and him and a few unqualified Grapearl pilots. They had to make a transition from military assault tactics, to strategic calculations to minimize casualties and populace. The Grapearl military and Agency were polar opposites, Gimmy knew that, which is why when the initiative opened up 8 years ago, he knew that he needed to start finding the right people for the job.

Within 8 years, Gimmy turned nothing, into a team of trusted, young, new generation members who the President, and the galaxy could count on. "I couldn't have done 75% without you Darry," Gimmy sincerely looked at his sister and put his hands on her shoulders, "The sacrifices you do for us day in and day out are the things that keep me and the team safe. I am grateful." Darry shut her eyes to brace herself to let go. "Then Gimmy," she candidly spoke, "It's with your permission then, that after we find and stop whoever is leading the Anti-Human Revolution, I wish to resign from the Agency." Gimmy stepped back briefly in shock. The agency was everything to her, why would she suddenly leave it? "There are more important things in life," she played with her hands again, twirling the ring around her ring finger. Gimmy took notice of her body language and understood a little more.

"Rook coming here, us taking her away from Kiyoh and Dayakka, you never understand how much a parent misses their children when they're on the road." Gimmy then stood next to his sister, looking up at the sky and resting his hands on the railing. "Derech and Izzy are getting older now," he remembered, "As their uncle, I miss them too Darry. I know you also miss **him** as well." Darry gave a cheesy smile, "Oh that loaf I call my husband? Don't worry about him, he understands." She got serious for a moment, "But the kids, I don't want to miss another moment." She looked to her brother, "Gimmy, the Agency can operate in autonomy now, let's go home, let's go back. Help me and honey raise the kids so we can enjoy that peace."

Gimmy closed his eyes, he couldn't live without Gurren Lagann Agency, he knew it, Darry knew it, but he had to respond to the closest member of his family. "I can't leave the Agency," he muttered, "Gurren Lagann is still mine, it's the burden I've been forced to bear. Maybe if someone one day, someone who has that fire like **him** , I'll start transitioning the responsibility of piloting Gurren Lagann to them one day. But until then-"

"Overseer!"

The comm lines scratched. "This is Noda, we're at what we believe is a warehouse over here next to the wharf. We don't have visual on the prisoner, but he seems to have stopped here. Please get these coordinates we're uploading." "Roger that!" Darry responded. With the tender moment shared between twins shattered with business, Darry took her leave to go back inside. "I think," Gimmy stopped her, "We need to do our proper research on the prisoner, Inspector. Please find out all you can about him as well." She nodded, "Roger that!" "Oh and Darry." He called out. "Yes Gimmy?" "After this is all over," Gimmy looked at the stars, "I hope to be able to see the same stars with you and the family soon." Darry nodded choking back tears, "Roger that Chief."

Outside of Wharf 11, Warehouse 23

"He's been stopped there an awfully long time," Reza mentioned, "It doesn't take this long to report back a coast being clear." Noda and Sylveria were waiting by their gunvan with Anne. Anne waiting patiently in the back cargo hold, shining her rifle. "If you want, I can take a scope through one of those windows." "You think I wouldn't think of that already Rook?" Reza patronizingly asked, "Solerians have some of the best eyesights this side of the universe. That's why we all love ourselves some run n' gunnin'." Reza kept peeking his head from various angles, "I seriously can't see anything from this vantage point." The team looked at Noda, the most senior member on the team, "Thoughts Noda?" Anne asked her old friend from Earth. Noda cupped his chin briefly and closed his eyes to focus.

"That kid HAS been at that same spot for at least 10 minutes already," he thought to himself, "There's a plethora of possibilities for the delay, he could be tipping them off, he could be dead, he could even be scared and trying to tell us something." Noda opened his eyes and turned around to face his team, "One thing is for sure, he's been static for 10 minutes, all possibilities point toward a potential loss of lead. We cannot sit idly by, I'm suggesting we all _covertly_ investigate." He emphasized the word "covertly" specifically for one person. "We're going to be quiet, right Cowboy?" The Space Cowboy took a slight, but nonetheless agreed to the conditions. Before they knew it, the 4 members packed their gear and began steadily making their way to the designated warehouse.

Like professionals, this team was trained. Three of the four team members specifically had a propensity towards stealth tactics, so even if the Space Cowboy were to mess things up, he would potentially be the only casualty. Still, the Agency has a good success rate, a very high one as a matter of fact, near flawless, they weren't going to be taken out this time by Reza making a simple mistake. They whisked down the hill and close by the building. The team searching each window and peering into it from each corner to avoid exposure. They had to be very careful. Sylveria had an upper hand. Her reptilian physiology allowed for natural skin pigmentation camouflage. She deserved her call sign, The Stealth Ninja. When the team found no signs of any hostiles, they decided to make their way into the building, carefully of course.

Noda was the first to fearlessly go in, he peered around every corner and shipping container and did not see any person or object. It was almost as if this warehouse had been completely packed up and deserted years ago. Reza followed in, followed by Anne and the emptiness made Reza preemptively speak, "I don't get it," he said frustrated, "We were following that punk thief, and he just disappears without a trace. Did he lead us on?" Anne holstered her rifle, on the ready for anyone popping out of any corners. "Not likely," she responded, "Have you seen how he looks? The guy looks like an idiot!" Sylveria came in through an open window and swiftly landed on her powerful tail and legs.

Her entry was enough to get the team's' attention, and she needed it now. She heard something, she placed her finger over her mouth. "Hush…" she used body language to convey. She cupped her hand over where her ear canal would be if she was human. "I hear something…" she was trying to say. The team got quiet. Sylveria slithered over to the sound of the noise, being as quiet as possible. As she approached a dark corner, she and the team saw a single shipping crate with a huge blind spot right behind it. The team flanked both sides, waiting for Noda's signal to pop out of the corner and get the drop on their unsuspecting guest. They waited, Noda gripped his sword. They waited, Reza placed his hands on his revolvers. They waited, Sylveria readied her shurikens. Anne was the most ready of all, she was already aiming at where her target "might be".

GO!

Out they popped to get the drop on their unsuspecting stranger and they found...Coco...shuffling the bomb jacket off from the top of him. Well this is quite embarrassing. Coco produced two gigantic sweat drops from his forehead. The Agency looked at him with a look of, "is he actually trying this right now!?" "So guys…" he nervously smiled, "...coast is clear…? He he…" The pissed off Anne yelled loudly and began shooting. This was the motivation Coco needed to immediately kick the straight bomb jacket off of him and fall into a hole he conveniently and preemptively dug for himself prior to attempting this. "YOU CAN'T GET AWAY!" Anne tried to yell as he was long gone deep in the tunnels.

"Seriously they left when I got here...but this is really the placcceeeeee." He echo stopped. "SHIT!" Reza slammed his hand on the nearest wall. "We lost a key criminal, and that sucker duped us all." Noda thought clearly for a second after removing his hand from readying his sword. "I wouldn't be so sure of that," Noda said with confidence, "That boy may be many things, but he's not a liar. I believe him." "Come again!?" Anne asked incredulously. "Think about it, we strapped a bomb to his chest, there's no way he'd gamble taking us to the wrong location."

"But they're not here," Reza pointed out obviously. "Which is precisely the point," Noda concluded, "They used that boy, he doesn't know it, but whoever sent that boy to us in the first place, they planned this, they wanted us here, why?" Sylveria caught on and was on Noda's side, Reza and Anne needed a bit more convincing. "In any case, we need to call this in to the Chief and Inspector."

"Overseer," he called out, "Target lost, I repeat, target is lost. And also, don't be mad, but we lost the kid too." The team looked around the warehouse cautiously to make sure there was no final surprises. Anne let out a whimper,

"This night could not get any worse."


	7. C5: I'm No Hero, I'm Just A Driller

Chapter 5

Darry was busy typing away at her monitor. Her glasses reflecting the text on her screen scrolling up as she was busy typing on an augmented reality keyboard in thin air. "Interesting," she spoke aloud to herself, "This guy is just merely a petty crook, on Earth, he's just been robbing fruit stands for food and from time to time will crash into people's' houses in order to get some sleep. They've jailed him a couple of times, but mostly he was sent to juvie. Seems more than anything he was a poor kid growing up."

Gimmy heard Darry speaking to herself through their connected earpieces, "Find anything Darry?" Darry focused on reading and speaking to Gimmy concurrently, trying to make sense and draw conclusions of the person she was researching. "Overseer, Target lost, I repeat, target is lost. And also, don't be mad, but we lost the kid too." Gimmy was heard through the earpiece banging his hand on the table, "Damn!" he cursed aloud, "Darry, just who the hell is this kid?"

Darry typed faster, "Chief, I've been reading more about this kid. He's not the one we should worry about." "What the hell do you mean Darry?" frustration in Gimmy's tone, "He potentially tipped off the enemy and managed to escape the team. That's grounds for a pretty suspicious kid." Darry could be visibly seen looking at the end of the personality profile for their prisoner, she read the last few lines of his biography, "Gimmy, he seems like a poor kid from Earth," she sympathetically said, "I see nothing here that points him to any criminal affiliations, his credline card literally was maxed out when he bought his last ticket at Earth Perception Transit Station."

Gimmy gritted his teeth, "But something doesn't add up, he's too good. Besting our rookie agent is one thing, but escaping 3 trained ones with a prodigy agent, that's just too much." Darry read the last line of his profile, "NO WAY!?" she incredulously yelled. "What is it?" Gimmy asked being suddenly startled. "It can't be…" "What can't be Darry!?" "...his legal guardian...his name is Copernicus-"

 **BOOM!**

Outside of the secret discrete office headquarters of the Gurren Lagann Agency and on a rooftop across that building, a militant man wearing a red beret had enough time to load his rocket launcher with a explosive missile. His colleague with binoculars examined two windows, a large top floor window where the red haired Gimmy Adai sat at his large oak desk, and another on the top floor in a completely different room that had the pink-haired Darry Adai getting excited as she rose from her monitors after reading something on the screen. The militant men pulled out a walkie talkie and spoke into it. "We got two in the building." They waited for a response. "Light em up," the voice on the radio responded. The rocket launcher was set free, it was unleashed on the roof that was above the room Darry was in, and she paid the price dearly for going into work that day.

"DARRY!" Gimmy immediately sprung out of his chair and began running towards the doors. He made his way through the hallway, it now had a burning skylight. He wished for the best but it appeared that the worst was happening right now. He kept making his way further into the complex and finally reached the room Darry would be in. He used his hand to feel the door, ensuring he wouldn't be walking into a room ready to explode, it was cool to the touch. He kicked the door down, then he saw his worst fear become reality. "DARRY!" a concerned Gimmy rushed over to his sister. She lay prone into the cold steel floor, the top of her body, mainly her head, left shoulder, and left arm were clearly seen. But the rest of her body was being crushed by a major support beam that had been above her. Gimmy frantically searched for signs of life. He found them. He was grateful.

"I need to get you out of here Darry." Darry was unconscious, she couldn't respond. But every second she was crushed by that concrete beam, was another second that Gimmy felt her breath slow, her pulse weaken, and she would die eventually if this kept up. Gimmy desperately searched for something, anything that would save his sister. He looked around the room frantically. "She has bombs," he thought, "But this is probably going to hurt her more than help. If only that kid was here with his drill." The light bulb in his head flickered, "Drill? That's it!" Gimmy clutched the core drill necklace in his hand, he kneeled over to Darry one last time and silently held her hand, "Hang in there sis. I'm not going to let you die like this."

And with that, Gimmy ran faster than he ever could. He went out of the room past the burning hallway. If he took too long to execute his plan, the flames would engulf the entire building and chances are his sister would be burnt into ash. Gimmy placed his index finger over his left ear and spoke, "Team, return to base, I repeat, return to base, the Inspector is trapped beneath rubble and needs immediate assistance." He stopped for a second to start his guncar to begin driving to the weapons storehouse. Even though it was only two streets down, he couldn't risk any wasted second on returning to rescue Darry. "I'm making my way to the weapons storehouse to wake up the beast, you all need to try to free Overseer just in case I'm not successful." Gimmy didn't wait for a response, he pressed his foot on the pedal to accelerate at a blinding speed and he was soon gone.

Diamond District

Earlier in the week, Coco had managed to break into one of the shops of Big Mama, a notorious criminal who laundered the money she made from guns into a legitimate jewelry shop that specializes in diamonds. Today, as Coco made his way through the diamond district, he noticed that the same shop he'd broken into earlier, was now closed for repairs, they obviously removed out all the merchandise to prevent further theft. He looked at the window of the shop, staring at his own stern reflection, "Easy come, easy go I guess." Coco had a single sling brown sack of his belongings around his back. It was time for him to head home.

"The next Perception Teleportation to Planet Earth leaves in 10 minutes," a melodic voice from the PA system chimed in. The vagabond driller turned around and saw the large Perception Teleportation Station of Neo Neptune. The station was huge, a large neon sign beaming with the words "Perception Transit" on the front of the building, the stairs leading up to a set of grand entrances that welcomed thousands of guests a day going to every corner of the galaxy. Perception Teleportation required very experienced conductors, they were usually older spacefarers and lived for thousands of years. In order to travel the universe, they needed the life experiences and planetary attachments on each one of the transit installations. The conductors were some of the oldest living species in the universe, some looked very familiar to earthlings, such as gigantic anthropomorphic turtles or trees, things you'd normally associate with longevity.

"Sorry old man," Coco spoke to himself as he trudged along the steps, "I let you down. I always wanted to make sure we got that spot up in Kamina City, but it looks like we'll be staying in Waterton for a while."

 **BOOM!**

Coco turned his head towards the direction of the sound. It was very distant, the travelers going to the transit heard it faintly. But Coco is one with the earth, he felt the vibrations in his feet, things like this are sensitive to drillers. "That came, from that place," Coco recalled, "It's where those people are." Coco had many possibilities fly in his head. He knew that he should just keep walking and go to the station and run away. He walked more steps up, ignoring his instincts. "Those gang members, they wanted me to break in. What if they came back?" He stopped in his tracks. "It's not my problem," he justified, "I need to keep going. I'm just a driller, I'm not a hero." He continued trying to convince himself to do the right thing. The right thing of walking away. "The soil," he realized as he felt the shakes in the earth, "It's much softer that way." Coco turned around as he looked finally at the black skies in that vicinity become lit up by a soft hue of bright yellow and orange. The sky of Neo Neptune was bleeding. Coco clutched his bag and ran back.

"Oh man Coco you are so going to regret this later."

Noda, Reza, Sylveria, and Anne we're breaking every single traffic violation as they tried to rush their way back to headquarters. "We can't be late," Noda said, "Inspector needs our help." Reza annoyingly was in the passenger of the gunvan and kept tapping his hands on the dash of the van, "Well hurry up Noda, can't this darn thing go any faster?" Anne and Sylveria clutched onto the headrests of the seats Reza and Noda were sitting on and focused on the road. "You do know that driving like this is causing more unwanted attention that we're bargaining for right?" Anne pointed out. "But I think that whatever local police is up to, they're focused on that bleeding sky where HQ is." Sylveria shushed the current lead and pointed to the left, drawing Noda's attention to another smoke filled area of the district.

"What in the world is that!?" Anne alarmed. Reza flipped open the visor on the gunvan, where the mirror was, it displayed a tiny monitor which began showing the local news. "Shouka district local police have been combatting a local gang," the news anchor read out, "the perpetrator behind these attacks at this moment is unknown but it appears that with the weapons used in addition to eyewitness accounts, this is the work of one, Big Mama Jama, a notorious criminal mastermind of the underworld." The team all looked at each other, they were puzzled as what they had to do now, but all eventually looked at Noda, who would become a defacto delegator for things such as this.

"We need to split up," Noda took his arms off the wheel and started to tighten the strap to his waist, no doubt his holster to his weapon. He looked at Reza, "Cowboy," he call signed, "Take the wheel, you and Anne need to drive back to HQ." Reza leaned over and carefully took one leg to step in, Noda started shifting out of the driver's seat behind Reza and eventually Reza and Noda switched seats. "What about you Samurai?" Reza call signed back. "Sylveria and I are quickest on our feet," Noda meant no offense but Reza raised a single eyebrow at his friend, "You and Anne are supposed to be quick on your hands, so don't take that as a slight." As soon as Anne and Reza were satisfied with the answer, Noda continued, "Sylveria and I are getting off here, we'll take the roofs and alleyways respectively until we get to the local police station. They're going to need some help fending off those crooks. As soon as you get to HQ, help Overseer, then go to the weapons store, Chief is going to be there and we'll give our enemies some push back." Sylveria opened the side door to the van, the road looked extremely painful if they were to jump out now, but those two were trained, they should survive. "We're counting on you." And with that, Noda and Sylveria jumped out of the gunvan and landed perfectly, followed by some crafty and agile movement on the ground and roofs respectively. It was like watching parkour perfected.

The Agency's Headquarters was a couple minutes from becoming ash, Darry's eyes had finally opened. She looked around and saw the burning pile of rubble around her. She choked a bit at the carbon monoxide replacing the oxygen in her lungs. "I'm going to die here, aren't I?" she morbidly thought. She tried to push herself up with her single free arm, but she winced at the pain. The concrete beam that was crushing her didn't allow her to move as she normally would. Darry was usually a proud girl, but as the fire and smoke fed off her fears, she knew that survival was of utmost importance now. "Somebody help!" she screamed, afraid and alone. Her final thoughts rushed into her head. Even though the situation was looking bleak, she brought herself to her happy place.

In Darry's happy place, she had 4 people who were shrouded in a bright light. We know one of those people, the red-headed twin brother she calls Gimmy. They've been partners for life. They loved each other like family should. They've always had each other. A couple years ago, someone else was added to this happy place, a man who was rather ordinary looking, but had a beaming smile on his face. In Darry's mind and in public, he would call Darry his honey. This was Darry's husband. Not much is known about the man other than the fact that he makes Darry happy, oh and Gimmy approves of him too because he's probably the nicest guy this side of the universe. The last two people in Darry's happy place were here twins, the gene to produce twins ran in the family apparently. Totally opposite to Gimmy and Darry, the boy named Derech was a pink haired calm boy, and the girl was a red-headed firecracker named Izzy. She loved them more than anything.

Sadly, this happy place would be the last memory Darry would have, she closed her eyes, accepting her fate graciously. The life she led was great, she left Adai village, she overthrew a King, she helped beat the Anti-Spirals, and she'd top it off by leading the next generation of heroes by creating and supporting "The Gurren Lagann Agency." It was a good life…

...and it was about to continue on. She began to hear cracks at her concrete beam, a familiar sound. It was a whirring sound. The sound of metal machinery meeting stone. The sound of gears grinding away. The sound of air blowing the dust. This dust clouded her vision away from her savior, but before long, the concrete beam finally broke, and Darry was free. She was too weak however, because of all the strength and breath that the fire and the falling debris threw her way. It was no problem however, as her savior finally showed up as the dust and smoke kicked up some more. She opened her eyes, extremely thankful for a second chance she now had.

"We have to get out of here," the voice said. The voice was familiar. Darry with the last of her strength, slung her arm around the savior, and this savior used all their strength to lift her up and walk with her through the burning hallway. As they were sloshing their way through the debris, a final large steel beam crashed on their only exit. Hope extinguished in Darry's heart, but not in her savior's. With quick thinking, the savior saw a portion of the wall crumple, behind the wall they saw the outside of a large human body width sized tube. They were performing construction on this building and must have installed a trash chute to dump debris. The savior rushed over to the wall, took their arm, pressed it against the wall, and the most miraculous thing happen. Darry saw the wall instantly open up, a drilled hole to the opening of a soft trash chute tunnel. She was quickly thrown out. The savior followed right after. Both of them landed on a soft pile of soft itchy duct material used to line air conditioning pathways. It was bad on their skin, but at least it was a soft landing.

Now outside and away from the danger, Darry turned her face to see her savior. "You're…" she stumbled on her words, "...You're that kid, Copernicus-" Coco stopped her, "First of all, are you okay?" Darry nodded. "Second of all, friends call me Coco." Coco rose up, he noticed an ambulance and fire rescue coming towards the building and he signalled towards a recumbent Darry, laying in a pile of trash. "You're going to be okay," he said as he looked towards the direction of where the other building he was tasked with breaking in previously. "I have some unfinished business with the people who pulled this." Coco whipped his cape off his shoulder, revealing his drill arm. He pressed it against the ground and began drilling a tunnel towards the building he once broke into, trying to set every wrong he's done within the week to make it right.

Gimmy had finally reached the weapons storehouse. The fire from HQ across the street was intense enough that it lit up this usually derelict corner of the district. Even though the fence was cordoned off, a group of what Gimmy counted as 25 military types had already stationed their troops in various parts of the building. Along the rooftops there was snipers, along the entrances there were soldiers with automatic rifles, all the entries and exits were stationed with guards. The Chief of the Gurren Lagann Agency was at a standstill, there was nothing he could do to effectively get in swiftly. To make matters worse, he saw what the soldiers were doing. A man with green hair, fairly largely built and with plenty of military camouflage gear to boot, he was pointing at various crates to go into various guntrucks. Gimmy knew what was in those crates.

Long ago, Earth had designed a plethora of weapons that were under a special umbrella division led by Leeron Littner, the chief science advisor of Earth. A majority of weapons were made specifically to battle the Anti-Spiral threat of 25 years ago, but over the years, they've had modifications. Modifications to affect ALL forms of life. Every single Spiral race was not safe with these weapons in circulation. After Leeron found out about the horrific weapons the military had funded, President Rossiu filed an executive order immediately to ban them outright. Any derivatives or remnants of these weapons would swiftly be dismantled, recycled, and disposed of as soon as possible. That was 17 years ago. The humans kept some for safe keeping of course, because in the interest of science, you can't just throw away your most prized accomplishments, you have to hide them. Thinking that hiding them on a sister Earth installation under the guise of an abandoned warehouse lead by a relatively new Agency was something that apparently made sense to military, because why not?

Now in the hands of the enemy, Gimmy began to understand what action would need to be taken right now. He was outnumbered, but he surely wasn't going to let this happen. "Come on Gimmy," he chanted to himself, "This is what you've been living for." He put a silencer on his handgun. He didn't need a scope for this, he was experienced with the iron sight on his handgun. He slowly picked off three of the five people on the roof. Being snipers and all didn't make them any better shots than Gimmy's experience. The two remaining snipers saw their friends go down. One of the three fell off the building and fell five stories straight down in front of the two guards at the front door with assault rifles.

Despite hearing the large splat in front of them and being splattered with the expected blood and guts of their dead comrade, this didn't phase them. The snipers and automatic rifle men all began shooting at Gimmy. "Just my luck," Gimmy cursed to himself, "One just had to make a mess at the front door." The Chief was being sarcastic as usual. He was hiding behind a stockpile of old metallic barrels they kept outside. He was well protected, but based on their uniforms, the military men would soon figure out that they could easily flank him from his position, draw him out to the open, and the two snipers on the roof would then have easy pickings, no matter which way he went. He took this time to lean back on the metal drum, listening to the loud clanging of bullets to metal. He reloaded his gun, pointed it out from his cover, and began blindly shooting, hopefully hitting something in the process.

BOOF! The loud sound of a sniper rifle shot could be heard echoing throughout the already busy night sky.

BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! Repeated shots from a pair of dual revolvers also added to this nightly ambience.

It was a rather beautiful night, all things considered, the burning of the nearby Agency headquarters made the setting of the weapons storehouse a bright yellow and orange daylight atmosphere. The sounds of assault rifles, dual revolvers, sniper pot shots, and handgun shooting all made a rhythmic sound to battle which all soldiers would dance to. And for Chief Gimmy, the most beautiful sight would appear from those two sounds of rifles and revolvers. The beautiful Rook, Anne Littner, and the wild Space Cowboy, Reza Solenge, appeared before him above the hill. "We got your back," Reza responded as he kept unloading his rounds into the assault rifle folk who were shooting at Gimmy. Chief was still providing assisting fire, "What about the Inspector?" Chief was still obviously concerned about his twin sister.

BOOF! Anne let out another sniper shot at the other roof sniper to clean house on the top. "She's safe," Gimmy let out a sigh of relief upon hearing this, "She was already with the ambulance, getting loaded in the car." Anne kept focusing on her attention on more snipers coming out of the roof access door and making their way to setup and shoot. She got to them before they got to setup however. "I owe you guys a thank you." "Oh don't thank us pardner," Reza said as he was still busy shooting, "Someone got to her before us, I say she's got some type of guardian angel saving her." It's true that the team was currently in a life or death situation right now, but when you're trained like them, conversation becomes second nature to keeping calm and collected against military insurgencies. "I'm confused" Gimmy said as he was still taking potshots, "You guys didn't save her?" "Nope!" "Then Noda and Sylveria?" "Wasn't them either, they went to help out the local police."

"Then who?" Gimmy thought to himself more confused than ever. Gimmy then got his attention focused on who seemed like the leader. He was the leader because he had a noticeably different look to the rest of the soldiers. If they didn't know they were being attacked before, he knew now. The commotion caused by these three agents was enough to grab anyone's attention. He glared at them intently, growling as he bared his teeth. The green haired man then tapped on the cargo door of the two trucks. They were already loaded to the brim with precious weapon cargo as they began to drive away. This man stepped into the building and closed the two steel garage doors.

"We can't let those trucks escape!" Gimmy ordered, "Shoot them down, by ANY MEANS NECESSARY!" It didn't motivate Reza and Anne to try any harder, the two professional marksmen we're already setting the trucks in their crosshairs. Anne had an easier time, a single clicking of her spring loaded bolt, a quick aim, and a steady trigger finger was enough to bring the first truck down. She shot at the guntruck's legs, immediately making it buckle at the knees and collapse grill first into the sand.

Although Reza needed a bit more ammo, his methods were arguably much cooler. As the truck began getting momentum, the legs of the guntruck picking up speed, Reza needed a fresh chamber. He was really adept at this motion by know, a quick flick of his wrists released the chambers of his dual revolvers. He whipped off his cape, revealing a utility belt of various pockets and fasteners along his belt. He put one of his hands into one of the pockets and grabbed a handful of something. Not losing a single beat, he threw the objects from his hands, 12 carefully counted bullets were now floating in the air. In one swift motion and movement of his arms and hands, he loaded his chambers in mid-air, waving the chambers right over the bullets. It was almost as if his bullets and chambers were magnetically attached to bore perfectly in their chambers, only, they weren't, it was his pure skill. He unloaded his entire 12 rounds into the truck escaping. And no wonder too, he loaded up explosive bullets in his revolvers. It made quick work of the guntruck, cargo and major moving parts were immediately incapacitated from his bullets.

Gimmy, Reza, and Anne managed to stop these trucks from making it out of the premises, but their fight was far from over. They regrouped briefly, Gimmy taking point as his job dictated and began to speak to his two firearm experts. "We need to get inside," he said, "The stuff that these cargo have are just the appetizer, they want the main course." Everyone nodded their head in agreement and began making a run for the main door, now free from the two guards. This didn't mean that it was easier. The guntruck drivers came out to escape their fates. Bloodied at the face and unable to continue on, the did the one thing they knew how to do, they yelled, "Get them!"

Before long, out of the main door, nearly 13 soldiers came marching out in a single file line. They all crowded around in a ring around the three Gurren Lagann Agents. At first the ring they formed was loose, but they inched closer with each step, ready to pounce on the three agents in what would try to be a beating of a lifetime. The three Agents grouped together, backs to each other in a triangular formation. "Finally," Anne thought, feeling the rush of battle. She slung her gigantic sniper rifle behind her, it looked oversized on her, but she carried in on her back with ease, not letting the unsightly and awkward shape bother her movement. Reza simply tossed his revolvers in the air and caught them by the barrel. The heaviness of the butt of his revolvers and the shape made it look like he was holding two hammers in his hands, he might as well have been. When it came to Gimmy, he just cracked his knuckles. "Let's rumble." He simply said. Reza and Anne obliged and rushed into the crowd.

Let's talk about Reza first. They call him the Space Cowboy, he normally was the team's resident gunner, but when it came to close quarter fighting, he didn't have the proficiency you expected from an agent. Bar fights are his specialty: throwing chairs, biting, sucker punches were the norm in his good old-fashioned brawls. Nonetheless, he could handle his own in a close quarter fight, equaling his gun prowess with a technique he'd like to call, gun kata'in. The Space Cowboy knew he couldn't throw a punch or a complex kick, but with his two revolvers, he knew how to club his enemies very well and very hard. Fighting against these soldiers, his technique consisted of swinging his revolvers wildly and powerfully to club their legs and pound their upper bodies. A scene out of a gritty Sollywood motion picture, he was literally taking his group of enemies off their feets. They'd float briefly in the air only to get promptly clubbed down by the butt of his gun. When he managed to grab a hold of one of the soldiers, he'd repeatedly bash their skull in with the handle until they bled, he'd toss his enemy off and get started on another. Reza couldn't out technique you, but no one could doubt the results of his good old fashioned gun katas.

Anne was every bit how she looked. She was beautiful yes. This translated to her fight motions being more graceful and elegant than Reza. With her curvaceous body, she would easily be able to mesmerize her victims with her motions of fight. Every single turn of her body would reveal a new curve or angle to the enemy, making them blush and get distracted in the middle of a life or death fight. It didn't help either that she purposely kept her cleavage continuously showing. Moments bending down or jumping suddenly would provide the needed distraction to handle her plethora of enemies she fought along the way. But the biggest deadliest aspect of Anne in a fight was her intelligence. Anne's fight style is not to be like a boxer and out power your opponent, it wasn't even about kicking fast and hard. Her preferred method of fight, was using your own anatomy against you. Her strikes aimed for vital soft spots on a species' anatomy: the neck, the ears, the temples, the vagus nerves, the solar plexus. They were all fair game to Anne. As soon as enemies attacked her, she'd be the first the slip around them and provide an immediate counter attack. And what happened when she fought bigger soldiers and enemies? Remember that sniper rifle she had on her back slung over? We thought it would be a hindrance and interfere in her fight movements, but indeed the barrel itself was used as a weapon. As bigger soldiers attacked her, Anne would simply - bend over. This provided three forms of attack. The enemies behind her would see her derriere which formed perfectly in her biker suit. The enemies in front would be met with her cleavage. And the enemies who towered over her would meet the tip of her barrel, poking out their eyes, nose, mouth, necks, you name it.

Finally, last but not least, Chief Gimmy, leader of the Gurren Lagann Agents was fighting the only way he knew how, with an in your face style of reckless abandon. Gimmy was always used to being small his whole life. When he was a child member of Team Dai-Gurren, he was the smallest on the team. When he was a young cadet of the Grapearl squadron, he was the youngest on the team, which made him the smallest. He used his disadvantage and thought of new ways to be inventive in his approach to fight. Gimmy knew he had a shorter arm span reach, so what do you do when you lack reach, you go in your face to the enemy. You see, Gimmy Adai knew something about people who would fist fight, they used their legs, their long arms, their reach to put distance and give sucker punches to their shorter reach brethren. Gimmy took advantage of this fact and just rushed in everytime. He would take one or two punches to the face, but that was a small price to pay to close the gap between him and his opponent. It's true that Gimmy had accumulated a huge toll on his body in this way, constant bruising, internal bleeding, not good to have when you're young. But Gimmy's experience with this form of fight gave him a distinct advantage, he was fearless. As soon as the red haired firecracker of a Chief closed the distance between himself and his victims, he would proceed to deliver the most powerful forms of strikes he knew: elbow strikes, knee strikes to the gut, pounding fists to the chests. You can tell when Chief Gimmy got on a roll, because every fight against an enemy from the Chief ended up with one sound, "THUMP!" Thump was the sound it made when his fists and strikes collided with their chests. Thump was the music he heard whenever he began wildly pounding at his enemies. And no offense to the trained Anne or the enigmatic Reza, but Gimmy's form of fight guaranteed one outcome every time, the enemy would stay down the first time, everytime.

Before they knew it, the team had taken down all their poor unfortunate fodder. Feeling victorious but not relishing in the win, the agents rushed into the front doors of the warehouse where they were met with even more opposition. A raining hailfire of automatic rifles once again rat-a-tat-tatted through the weapons storehouse. Gimmy kept running straight into the fire. "You know what to do," he thought in his head and immediately Reza gave him cover fire in a run and gun style of shooting. With Anne hanging back, she made sure to snipe faster than she'd ever sniped before. The enemies were falling like flies. "I'm almost there," Gimmy told Reza as he kept running towards a gigantic red robot in the middle of the room, "We're going to retake this storehouse and then we're going to-"

Click, whirrrrrr.

The sound of heavy machinery turned on, the gigantic robotic Gurren Lagann came back online, and it's first order of business, "COWBOY ELIMINATING SMACKDOWN!" The gigantic 50 foot robot picked up its' foot and managed to turn Reza into the biggest soccer ball the world had ever seen. This impact was enough to make a human beings' ribs become shattered. Luckily, Reza shielded his body with his hands, but that didn't do much. Reza flew from the foot of Gurren Lagann, to the opposite wall. Had there not been any crates there, he would have probably died from the impact alone. He was out. A shocked Gimmy Adai stared in horror as Gurren Lagann came back online, without him in it. "This can't be," he thought. The pilot of the newly revived mecha opened Gurren's mouth, showing the pilot inside.

It was the green haired and muscular military man. "Greetings Chief Gimmy Adai, I am Lieutenant Scourge." He then readied a drill arm and aimed directly for Gimmy on the floor. Luckily he dodged it. Scourge knew he had Gimmy on the ropes, so he decided to toy with him a bit. Any full impact against Gurren Lagann would result in both Gimmy and Anne becoming splatter on any of the surfaces in this warehouse. In complete hubris, Scourge decided to monologue a bit.

"Did you know, that the Anti-Human revolution had our eyes on your agency for the longest time. You disgust us. Your actions haven't made anything better. If anything, they're at an all-time worst. You keep these weapons in this storehouse facility, hoping to use it again against those who would disagree with humanity. Well I'm here to take it back. You are all drunk on your own ego of this universe. You think you own everything. But now, I own your precious symbol of hope, Gurren Lagann. I've done much research over my time with Gurren Lagann, you thought since you had the core drill, you are the only one who can use it? Did you know this puppy operates on MY fighting spirit? The fighting spirit that i've perfected through numerous Anti-Spiral races?"

Gimmy was tiring now, he could only dodge the drills of Gurren Lagann for so long. Scourge knew this, and he saw it, he saw Gimmy tire out from the constantly soft balls Scourge presented as Gurren Lagann. Small drills emitted from the fingertips, shot to the floor, in an attempt to see Gimmy dance. Gimmy's dodging was not fruitless however, it was a plan for Anne to switch out her normal armor piercing bullets, to become Anti-Tank impact rounds. She loaded one in and shot it at Gurren Lagann's stomach, the entry point for Gurren. The impact was direct, Gurren Lagann took a stumble and Scourge felt the pain. "You witch!" he angrily shot a large drill at Anne.

Anne dodged the direct hit, but Scourge wasn't aiming for her, he was aiming for the wall. The drill caused mass debris from the building to collapse on Anne. Despite her attempts to run away, she was caught in the eventual avalanche. Anne clutched onto her rifle, so it didn't leave her persons', but the avalanche of rubble limited her mobility and her lower half of her body was completed blocked from getting additional ammunition. She might as well have been knocked out from the impact of the debris, but strong Anne held on through sheer will in order to support her Chief to fight on. "I've had enough of this!" Scourge smacked Gimmy with a low sweep of his gigantic Gurren Lagann hand, Gimmy couldn't dodge this one. His entire body was promptly blindsided by the sudden hand smack, he flew and skidded right in front of Anne, laying prone with her face to face.

"Hahahaha!" Scourge maniacally laughed, "The great Gimmy Adai, some legend you are. Now you die!" This was the end, Scourge knew it. He won. He took control of Gurren, which in turn took control of the whole robot body of Gurren Lagann. After he would kill the team, the weapons storehouse would be his. The universe would feel the wrath of the Anti-Human Revolution as weapons of mass destruction engulfed the cosmos in flames. Gurren Lagann prepared a drill on its' arm. Inching closer to the forehead of Gimmy Adai. Today is the day, that the immaculate record of the Gurren Lagann Agency failed, and closed it's chapters.

But to someone else, today was not that day. A ring of crackling earth on Gurren Lagann's left leg began forming. The ring eventually became a hole. It collapsed under the weight of Gurren Lagann and the gigantic mecha had lost its' balance, falling left leg first into a deep tunnel pit, but not falling all the way. "The first lesson of having a drill," a determined voice spoke, "ALWAYS watch your feet." Scourge was taken off guard, his head knocked the inside of Gurren's console. As he regained composure, he tried to find the source of the voice. "Who said that!?" he angrily scanned the room until he found a single shadow shrouded in the dust that Gurren Lagann had kicked up from falling in the hole. "YOU THINK YOU'RE SOME KIND OF HERO!?"

The dust finally cleared. He was indistinguishable: the red cape, the two cowlicks, the arm drill. It was Copernicus, friends called him Coco. He glared at Gurren Lagann with distaste and finished off his final line.

"I'm no hero. I'm just a driller."


	8. C6: We're Just A Bunch of Nobodies

Chapter 6

The mighty Gurren Lagann, a mecha with limitless potential, was being piloted by a man of strong fighting spirit, the indomitable Lieutenant Scourge. He had been in wars against the Anti-Spirals ever since he was in the Neo Neptune army. The planet was named differently back then, but the Kepler 616 galaxy star system didn't find the need to name this black planet anything other than death incarnate. They called it such because this is where the people of Kepler 616 would go to die. Back when the Anti-Spirals had their iron fist over the universe, Neo Neptune was a military installation. They would stage their Spiral warriors to battle the Anti-Spirals here at the forefront. The foreboding dark skies would reflect the demeanor of the people of Kepler 616. Nobody was a hero in this star system, there were only martyrs.

Lieutenant Scourge was one such potential martyr. Exhibiting a high capacity for Spiral energy as a young child, he caught the eye of a young colonel who wished to provide a major dent in the Anti-Spiral operation. They never did go all the way however, a hero from the planet of Earth risked it all against the Anti-Spirals in a high stakes game which humanity had won. After the war, Kepler 616 lost all their military luster. The king who ruled this star system fell into complacency and comfort, focusing instead on appeasing the Earth heroes instead of taking care of his own people. Both Scourge and his superiors concluded only one thing, it was all the humans' fault.

That is why Scourge created the Anti-Human Revolution. That is why he has been spreading propaganda to Kepler 616 and other star systems of the human selfishness, deceit, and vices. Finally, this is why he planned such an elaborate plot to pilot Gurren Lagann. He knew what the giant mecha represented: a symbol of hope, a symbol of peace, a symbol of humanity. He wanted to corrupt and pervert that symbol, turning it into a force of disgust and oppression. Even though he is on the verge to succeeding, at this moment, he is being thoroughly embarrassed.

"YOU THINK JUST BECAUSE YOU CAUGHT ONE OF MY LEGS I'LL LOSE TO YOU!?" Scourge yelled at a smirking Coco, "I still have this other le-" At that very moment, Gurren Lagann's other leg caved into another pre-drilled hole that Coco had prepared before his entrance. Scourge got visibly red and upset. "Oh I forgot to mention," Coco teased, "Apparently the owners of this building decided to leave some concrete mix outside of the compound. I helped myself to a couple of packs." Coco rubbed his nose, thinking himself clever, "I also hope you don't mind me using your water?" he addressed Gimmy on the floor, "Concrete doesn't just settle itself you know."

Scourge was beet red at this point and ready to explode at a moment's notice. Unbeknownst to Coco, this was the source of Scourge's fighting spirit, anger drove the man who was once a hero-martyr to his people to a point of extreme rage. "I CAN STILL KILL YOU!" The arms of Gurren Lagann were free to move around, even though the big mecha was buried from the pelvic area down, the arms were still Spiral death machines that could and would cause everlasting body damage if Coco were caught in a single strike.

It was quite a sight to behold with Coco against the gigantic mech, and by against it, we meant he ran away. With the legendary robot ensnared in cement, at least 20 feet deep, the robot really didn't have any room to run after the young driller. Instead, he shot as many drills as he could generate from his hands. Gimmy had earlier dodged this onslaught acrobatically before faltering at the last second. Gimmy was older by quite a couple of years, but he still had his gymnastics down. While he did lose the spring in his step to do anything spectacular, he was very serviceable as a normal man dodging various attacks from the universe's most powerful robot. In contrast, Coco was clumsy, comically clumsy. When he dodged, he would tuck all his body parts in as close to him as possible, shaking after every successful dodge. It literally looked like an arachnophobe shaking off spiders when they've been on their body. But as much as people would make fun of Coco for exhibiting such cowardice in the heat of battle, he was doing a particularly admirable job avoiding every single hit.

"HOLD STILL YOU MAGGOT!" Scourge gritted his teeth as his Spiral gauge inside of Gurren's dashboard steadily rose. This extra strength giving Scourge the needed energy to crack the cement which locked in his right leg. "I will crush you!" Scourge's legs were now both free as he completely broke out of his stone prison. Anne, Gimmy, and Coco were alarmed that the pissed off Lieutenant was free once again. Coco ran for his life some more as Gurren Lagann unloaded bursts of drills towards his general direction. "Keep running," Anne cheered on. "Forget about us, save yourself!" Gimmy told him. "WHAT DO YOU THINK I'M TRYING TO DO!?" Coco replied back. Both Anne and Gimmy looked at each other in complete embarrassment. "This kid he's…" "...pathetic." Anne finished off Gimmy's sentence.

Coco kept running, but Gurren Lagann finally was catching up, the stride of a 50 foot tall robot could not be beaten after all. Coco desperately tried to reach the door which seemed so far away, "Must...reach...door...and I'm home...free," he huffed as he told himself. Gimmy looked as Coco kept running, his cape picking up wind as he ran. "He ought to do something about that cape," he mentioned. Suddenly, Gurren Lagann clutched the cape, which nearly became a noose for Coco's neck. Gimmy jinxed it obviously. "I knew that cape would be the death of him," Anne rebuked. She was bored out of her mind being buried in debris she couldn't shake off, but she grew concerned over their only savior being caught.

Coco was now hanging by his neck as Scourge controlled Gurren Lagann's arm to pick him up like a rat by the tail. Coco struggled as he gasped for air from the suffocating tightness of the knot he made in his cape. "About to die? It's okay let me help you." Scourge threw Coco right above Gurren Lagann's head and forced both of Gurren Lagann's hands to do a nice solid overhead clap. Anne and Gimmy stared in horror, as the force Gurren Lagann looked like it would have splatted Coco into a thin red paste. But whether it be luck this time or Scourge's compassion, or his pride, or his general playfulness, the clap didn't kill him. The clap nearly broke every bone in his body. Coco lay face up, looking at Gurren Lagann's face with his lifeless eyes, he lay in the palm of Gurren Lagann, ready to accept his fate.

"You foolish human," Scourge taunted, "Did you really think you could defeat me? A spiral warrior akin to that digger of Earth?

Maybe even better?" Scourge continued to ramble. "Let me tell you something boy, I detested you the minute you reared your head into that warehouse. You remind me of all the self-centered, overfident, insignificant humans, always thinking that your race is such a big deal in the grand scheme of things. Always suppressing those species who are not you. Did anybody ever tell you that the universe would be better without all of you?"

Scourge knew it was over, Coco lay defeated in Gurren Lagann's hand, all Coco could do was listen and watch. "First, I'm going to kill you in the most fitting way possible. And then, while you lay on my drill arm, I'll show you the hope of humanity you so depend on: that Chief right there, I'll shoot one drill right between his eyes." Scourge then pointed to Anne, "That girl, well, let's just say before she dies, I'll drill her in some other areas, before making sure that one drill makes it so far up in her body that it will come out of her mouth." Scourge was sick, he was truly a disgusting individual. As Anne gritted her teeth at the thought of being a plaything after death, Gimmy winced in pain as he felt the worst about to happen. "No," Gimmy thought to himself, "I can't let anyone get hurt. Not now. Not ever."

Scourge served up Coco, throwing him straight up in the air. As Coco looked at the ceiling, he began to think about everything Scourge said. "Are humans really that worthless? Do we make other spiral beings more miserable?"

Then Coco remembered.

It wasn't very long ago, maybe a couple of years back. Coco was scrounging for the last of the scraps he could find at a local food stand vendor. "What do you think you're doing kid?" A hairy lion-man hybrid spoke to him. "You dirty human," he said, "Pick your scraps from elsewhere." The lion frightened the young Coco, but there was someone who frightened the lion-man much more. "Hey Harry!" a domineering gigantic oaf of a man came over to the lion-man. The lion-man cowered in fear as the man approached his fruit stand. "You're late on your rent of this space, I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

"No please," the lion-man pleaded, he bared his teeth in a large smile, but the landlord took it the wrong way. "Want to bite me Harry?" Harry shook his head frantically, "No sir...I…" The landlord held his large baton over his head, ready to bash the lion-man over his head. Coco, still little and petite, walked in front of the lion-man, surely the landlord wouldn't hurt a small boy. "Stop it," Coco was missing his two front teeth, when he said 's' words, he would whistle. The landlord laughed at the young boy in incredulity. "Oh come on," he pushed Coco out of the way, tossing him to the floor to eat dirt, "What can you do kid? Is this Beastman your daddy? Perhaps I should teach you a lesson after I'm done with him." The landlord rose his baton, ready again to cave the lion Beastman's face in.

"That's quite enough," a man in a cloak stopped him, "He may be a Beastman, but you're the one acting like an animal." The man in the cloak stood tall and proud, he covered his face, but the landlord knew who he was. "Hey stranger," he said with a tone of caution in his voice, "A-a-a-are you already done with the tunnel?" The landlord stuttered, just what was he so afraid of from this cloaked man? Was it respect? Was it fear? "I came up," the cloaked man began a sentence as he reached for an apple-peach from the Beastman's fruit stand, "Because I needed a snack. Wouldn't want you to harm the fruit vendor who gives me a snack everyday at this time." The landlord lowered his baton, "I see," he said, "hurry up and drill the tunnels. I want you out of our town by tonight." The cloaked man took a bite of his apple-peach, "That's no problem." And the landlord walked away.

When the landlord went into his nearby house, the cloaked man went back to the lion-man's fruit stand. "Here you are," the man dropped 3 coins on the man's fruit stand counter. The lion-man, ever so grateful shook his hands and head, "No, it's quite alright." The man in the brown cloak watched the lion-man intently, staring into his soul. The lion-man knew what to do. He picked up two fresh apple-peaches and 2 of the 3 coins. He walked over to a muddied Coco and helped him up. "You didn't have to help me," he dusted the dirt off of Coco's shirt, "I sometimes forget that not all humans are like him. I'm sorry." He apologized and offered the two apple-peaches with 2 coins. "This should take care of you for a couple days, don't scrounge anymore okay, rotten fruit is bad for a kid like you." Coco rubbed his nose and thanked the stand owner. The lion-man looked one last time at the stranger, "Stranger, thanks for reminding me, fear and hate aren't ever the answer to fight against those kinds of people." The strange cloaked man nodded silently. "Don't spread the hate," he solemnly said.

Coco shot open his eyes. He was well aware of his situation as he was faced the ceiling. He was steadily elevating into the air, Gurren Lagann's arm pointed up and as soon as Coco would lose altitude, he would be impaled on the drill which would now act as his pike. "KID!" Gimmy shouted out, "TAKE THISSSSS!" Gimmy had set it up perfectly - he took off his core drill key off his neck, he told Anne to load it into the barrel of Lady Luck, Anne cocked back the bolt of her rifle. Now it was time for Coco to execute the perfect timing, assuming he was awake and aware what was going to happen. Anne fired.

Coco heard the gunshot, he tucked in his chin, seeing past his feet. He saw a shiny object coming right at him quickly, his instincts kicked in. It was hard for him to maneuver in the air, but this time, he had to try, he had to absolutely live. He was going to show the world, he was going to show his enemy, and he was going to prove to himself, that no matter how everyone treats him, however the bad guys would bully those they deem inferior.

"DON'T SPREAD THE HATE!" he screamed out.

Coco used the momentum from a forward roll in the air to flip upside down. The core drill key brushed his left cheek and whooshed by him, but he outreached his left hand and perfectly caught the string of the core drill necklace. Perfectly executed.

He now saw one of his potential fates, the drill of Gurren Lagann inching closer to his face. "I'LL SHOW YOU!" he yelled at Scourge, unleashing his revved up drill from his right arm. He pointed it down, his angle and acceleration as he fell was what he wanted. "If hate is the reason for all this madness, then I'll teach you, I'll teach everyone, to not spread it. You'll learn just as I have, that people, not just humans are capable of so much more than this!" At last, the arm drill of Coco and the powerful drill of Gurren Lagann met point to point. Gurren Lagann's drill was easily about to overpower the smaller drill mounted on Coco's arm, but the point wasn't to beat him in a test of strength.

Coco knew his way around a drill, he knew the feeling of the direction of the spin and he knew the momentum he came in at certain angles. He was uneducated in the science, but he was a master in the practicality. All he needed was that spin, that momentum, and he used it to redirect the force of his path in the air. Gurren Lagann's drill was more powerful, it turned him and with this force, Coco used the orbital momentum to shoot himself off the centrifugal pull of the drill and into the direction of Lagann, the smaller Gunman which would be the head, mounted on top of Gurren to form Gurren Lagann. The membrane of the Lagann cockpit opened up, welcoming a familiar key to enter back into it. Coco readied his impact. He landed perfectly into Lagann's cockpit seat. The roof closing on him finally. Coco instinctively knew what to do, he inserted the key into the Spiral gauge. "Lagann…"

" **SPIN ON!"**

A huge flash of blue, red, and purple lights shot out from all directions of the robot. Scourge was blinded by this lightshow. He could see everything from the window of Gurren. "What the hell is this!?" Scourge then noticed the large drill in his roof of Gurren about to detach. "No!" he screamed out, "You're not taking this away from me. I'm so close." Scourge forced Gurren's arms to clamp down Lagann from escaping, the energy in the warrior of the Kepler system kicking his Spiral power into overdrive. Above in Lagann, Coco felt the shockwave of the arms clamping down, forcing him to stay attached to Gurren. "You can hang on as long as you want," Coco yelled, "But you'll never stop me from reaching the stars." Coco clamped on tightly to the handles of Lagann, squeezing as the spiral gauge spewed out colors of the rainbow. "The lights in the sky are stars," he echoed the saying he heard long ago, "I'll fly together with Gurren Lagann to see them, and that means you won't be piloting this ever again!"

Scourge clutched onto the controls of Gurren, but it was no use, the lights from the spiral energy emanating from Coco sparked the main control systems of Gurren, Scourge let go, his hands falling wayside as the gigantic drill hole above him opened up. Lagann quickly produced feet and Coco was now in full control of Lagann. "My first order of business," Coco went gunman face to gunman face with Gurren, "I need to get you out of there!" Lagann's arms were powerful, they clutched onto the upper and lower jaw of Gurren's face. Coco grunted fiercely as he generated his strength into the arms of Lagann. Lagann had now become an extension of the young upstart, whatever Spiral energy was generating from the drill thief, was now pouring out of every crevice of Lagann.

Through sheer willpower, the face of Gurren finally opened up, a shocked Scourge shot his eyes wide open as he stared face to face with Lagann. He felt a sharp tug as Lagann's arm grabbed his lapel, "GET OUT!" Coco said as he yanked Scourge out of the cockpit and threw him in the opposite direction. He rolled, he bounced, but most importantly, he was out of Gurren. Scourge took a couple of scrapes as he skid along the concrete floor of the storehouse. Now Coco wanted him all to himself, he figured he should do the most humane thing at this moment. No longer was he going to be a coward and run away, he was going to face his problems head on. The membrane of Lagann opened up, a green light emanating from the cockpit, Scourge slowly picked himself up as he saw Coco, one leg hunched over on the dashboard of Lagann and staring right in the eyes, warrior to warrior.

"HIS EYES!" Scourge alarmingly noticed, "The sign of the spiral!" Coco's eyes had given off a strong spiral within his irises, and Scourge wasn't the only one who noticed. "The spiral…" Anne marveled. Reza was finally coming to, he was hunched over as he noticed Coco, "Well this is a surprise…" Both Anne and Gimmy looked briefly at Reza, thanking whatever forces in the universe that he was still okay enough to still be making jokes. Gimmy turned his attention back to Coco, "Just who the hell is this kid?"

"Let's finish this!" A sharp determination from Coco readied his drill arm, he began to rush towards Scourge. The green haired army man was finally standing tall, he had one surprise up his sleeve. The mark of a Spiral warrior was the ability to generate any solid matter from the Spiral energy around him. As such, Scourge conjured up the only thing he knew to combat this brash punk who was about to meet him head on, a drill. Coco was not afraid, Scourge was bigger, he may have been stronger, but he wasn't going to lose today. They met head on, two drills colliding with each other at the tip. Scourge stood valiantly in the face of the sparks flying from the two pieces of metal grinding against each other. But Coco was inexperienced, he couldn't control the energy imbued into him in this desperate moment of survival, he buckled his left knee slightly. "Well," Scourge taunted, "Looks like you don't know how to use the Spiral." Scourge continued to pour his own spiral energy into his drill arm and imposed his strength to buckle Coco's knees further. The young boy would seemingly be beaten at this test of strength.

"I guess this is where you say something dumb?" Scourge egged him on, "Are you going to say something like 'your drill will pierce the heavens?'" Coco smirked, "No, that's not what my drill is for." Scourge raised an eyebrow in confusion. Just what was so funny? "My drill doesn't need to pierce the heavens, someone already did that." Coco found second wind, his cape flapping in all sorts of directions as the spiral energy pulsed out in one big wave out of his body. He straightened out his knees, fighting back the more experienced Spiral warrior with the power of his own drill arm. "My drill's purpose is to restart this cycle, to transition the forgotten memories of the old and give birth to them anew," with a discernible confidence in his voice, he echoed the final purpose of his drill, "I'm going to start this shit again. My drill's purpose is to provide a 2nd spin!" Scourge's drill cracked as Coco's revved up faster, "...and don't you ever forget that."

An explosion.

That's what happened as Coco's own power proved too strong for the Lieutenant. The Lieutenant was thrown back from Coco, but that wasn't the only surprise, the energy emanating from Scourge's arm took manifestation. A light appeared briefly but then instantaneously turned into no light at all.

A Spiral nemesis black hole was born. Its' first target, the conjured Spiral drill of Scourge. Scourge screamed as it ripped the drill forcefully off his forearm instantly, his arm was next. The pain was excruciating. Coco held on to the enemy's free hand. "I'll save you…" he valiantly said, "Just hang on." Scourge chuckled at the irony, he wanted to kill this boy, and now he was getting saved by him. This wasn't worth the embarrassment. Scourge laughed. The rest of the black hole tearing various holes in his body. "Just you wait," he muttered, "The Colonel will come for you." As the final pieces of the Lieutenant disappeared into the ether, his voice reverberated throughout the room, "The Order will come for you." And with one final cackle, Scourge was gone. The 3 members of Gurren Lagann Agency and the one thief looked at the space where Scourge once was. Blankly staring as they tried to understand the gravity of what just happened. Coco fell on his butt in exhaustion, he didn't want his enemy to die, he simply wanted to defeat him. Why did he feel so empty? Was everything worth it all? "Don't feel sorry," Gimmy told him as he noticed his sadness, "The man chose the warriors' way, even though you feel at fault. Always remember that you did what had to be done." Coco looked at Gimmy and his team, he was expressionless.

Noda and Sylveria met back up with the team back at the burning remains of HQ. The fire department had alas put out the fire to the entire building and the remaining embers flickered. It left ground zero with a beautiful blackish orange glow. Noda was speaking to the local police away from the building, while Sylveria adjusted the towels draped over Anne's shoulders. Anne and Reza were sitting in the back of the ambulance, trying to get warm after being examined for their injuries, it was a rather cold night. Reza let his legs dangle over the rear bumper of the ambulance, "We sure got a big break today," Reza mentioned to his cohorts. Anne took a sip of her warm drink, hugging the warm mug in her two hands delicately. "Yeah," Anne said with a sigh, "Took down the leader of the AHR and the leader of the Diamond Gang." Gimmy walked over his three subordinates, "Don't forget," he interrupted, "We also have to be thankful that we're all safe." The team nodded in unison. "That's right."

Noda walked over to his team after talking to the officer, "You all look like you've seen better days," he sarcastically said, "Chief, I spoke to the officer and they mentioned the Inspector will be put in intensive care tonight to make sure she's back up and running in no time." Gimmy was relieved, he wanted to thank the person who had saved Darry, he nearly lost her and there's no way he could repay anyone for the life he saved. Suddenly, something caught the team's eye: Coco was handcuffed, a local police member was pushing him towards the direction of his gun squad car.

"So you know why we're arresting you kid?" Coco sulked as he recited what the officers originally booked him for, and then some: "Thieving diamonds, colluding with the enemy, obstruction of justice, breaking and entering-" "Wait a second...breaking and entering?" the cop asked. "Yeah," Coco looked at the burning remains of HQ with pride, "Someone almost lost their life here tonight. I got her out just in time. I'll admit to that all day." Coco smiled. "I wonder if she's safe and sound somewhere," he thought.

"Wait!" Gimmy heard enough, "Officer, I need to ask the prisoner a question." Gimmy stared intently at the piercing gaze of Coco, "Were you really the one who came here tonight?" Coco smiled and nodded in affirmation, "Yep, and I'm glad I did. That girl with the pink hair, the building nearly went down on her if I didn't get here in time." Gimmy gasped, "He saved Darry?" Gimmy simply couldn't believe it, the person he had to thank, was the person who potentially started the whole mess with the Anti-Human Revolution to begin with. Was this his way to atone? Gimmy sternly mentioned one phrase to the officer, "Release him." The officer gawked at Gimmy with a look of confusion. Gimmy's own team looked at Gimmy the same way. "He's one of us officer, release him now." The officer obliged. The team looked on in confusion some more, but they knew not to question their Chief's executive decision because there was always a reason.

Coco's cuffs were removed, the officer put them back on his holster and he bid farewell, leaving the team and Coco to have a conversation. "You're a big flake," Gimmy insulted, "You're awkward when you fight. You're awkward when you run away. You ramble when you have nothing to say. You're a crook. You broke the law by escaping my team." Coco was puzzled. Just what was the point of this conversation? "But even so, you saved my team today," Gimmy's serious tone lightened up, his team couldn't help but crack a smile as well, "You showed guts. You showed determination. You even said a cool catchphrase." Coco rubbed his nose, his ego inflating on each praise mark he received.

"But you're raw," Coco's ego was shot back down to earth, "Maybe you want to tryout for our team to not be as awkward as you are?" Coco was absolutely flabbergasted, this team, whoever they were, had Gurren Lagann in their store house. Whoever they were, he concluded, they were a big deal. They were definitely tied into some branch of the Earth government, high above the ranks so that not only would all his petty crimes be pardoned, but he would finally be able to move on from the thief life into one among the stars. Gimmy looked for affirmation, he turned to Noda - thumbs up. He turned to Reza - thumbs up. He turned to Sylveria - thumbs up. When he turned to Anne, she had her arms crossed in indifference, "Well don't ask me," she apathetically said.

Coco extended his hand to Gimmy, "I'm Copernicus," he introduced, "My friends call me Coco." Gimmy took Coco's hand and shook it, "Gimmy Adai." Coco smiled as he shook his hand intently. Ready for his new future, Coco just had one more question, "Just who are you guys?" The team gathered around, regrouping next to Gimmy to meet their new protege. "Us?" Gimmy pointed at his team. "Don't worry about that for now, all you need to know is…"

"We're just a bunch of nobodies."


	9. E: The Revolution Will Lead to Order

Epilogue

Gimmy Adai sat at his desk, the open air of his burned down HQ office was a good view that day. He didn't see the blue skies he could on Earth, but thank the stars that Neo Neptune hummed a melodic buzzing of their neon signs to lull him to a certain peace. He looked down the burned down remnants of his building to see the room where Darry used to work happily. She was gone. Today, Gimmy Adai sat at his desk covered with ash and soot, and decided to fill out the paperwork. The title of the paper he was signing said it all.

"Request for Resignation: Inspector Darry the Overseer."

Gimmy found it a little bittersweet, but he knew he was doing the right thing. He signed the line beneath the subtitle - "Superior approval" but there was still one other line which needed to be signed, this line read "Command in Charge Approval." "Guess I need to call him too," Gimmy sighed. He picked up his mobile device and conjured a holographic screen in mid-air. He pressed a couple of buttons, no obvious tactile feedback, but the screen seemed to reflect his actions. The line began to ring.

On the other end, a familiar face appeared, he had glasses and a bowl shaped blue haircut. "Chief Advisor Guinble Kite," Gimmy saluted, "It's been a while." Guinble saluted back. "First of all let me say it is with great pride that I salute you for a mission accomplished, not too many could bring down the leader of the AHR and Diamond gangs." Gimmy was humble, he really didn't deserve the praise. Besides, Gimmy had been down in the dumps since he nearly lost Darry in the fire. "I'm sure you've heard already Commander," Gimmy revealed the true identity of the man, "Darry has submitted her resignation." Guinble fixed his glasses from the bridge of his nose, "I have heard. She told me so in the hospital the other day."

Gimmy grew a concerned look on his face, "How is she?" Guinble gave him a light fist pump, "Still strong as ever," he smiled, "You know you twins are the most headstrong. You guys will outlive all of us, you're all too stubborn to die." Gimmy chuckled. "Chief Gimmy," Guinble called his attention, "I hope you haven't completed the paperwork for Darry's immediate resignation, have you?" Gimmy shook his head. "Good! Because before you do that, you need to know that sister of yours is a workhorse, she looked into the data you forwarded us and she hasn't stopped researching since getting back here on Earth." The pride on Gimmy's face was clear, but he downplayed it a bit, he found it humorous that Darry would quit the team, but would still find some way to stay attached to the team in some way. "Just like her," he thought.

"So what's turned up?" Gimmy asked inquisitively. Guinble's face got serious, "We managed to decode the fluctuations in the Spiral nemesis black hole you witnessed that day. Your body cam happened to pick up the whole incident. Darry found something weird appearing in the black hole." It didn't make any sense. Black holes by nature would absorb light, how would Darry be able to pick up an image? Was the computer vision algorithms defective? Did they pick up something else? Guinble relayed the footage, it was processed through numerous filters but there was no doubt. Within a replay of the footage, the colors were inverted, the black hole became a white hole and a face was clearly seen whenever a black hole sucked up a piece of Scourge's body.

Gimmy looked in terror, the face appearing as if it was some form of apparition speaking to whoever watched the footage. He saw the mouth move repeatedly, he couldn't read its' lips. "Just what is it saying?" Guinble pulled up another doc sheet on his tablet next to him. "Per Inspector Darry, she's managed to decipher the speech. It's lip movements are reciting something in an ancient language of the universe, she's cross referenced the speech patterns and syntax and I'm playing back what could be the message being sent," Guinble flicked a media file over to Gimmy's mobile device screen, a media player with the play button ready to be pressed appeared, "Have a listen." Gimmy was nervous, the face shook him up briefly, he'd never seen something so unsettling before, but he needed to hear the message, he pressed the button.

"Foolish humans," it said in a low modulated voice, "Spiral nemesis is inevitable every day. With your race at the helm, we cannot trust any further reach of the universe in your hands. This universe will not be yours, we'd rather see it in Spiral nemesis instead of you claiming and raping everything that encompass it. We tried to warn you with Revolution, you didn't listen. Now you will comply to the Order."

"The Order!?"

"Yes, we are called the Order. The Order is as old as the universe itself, we've maintained it with the Anti-Spirals at the helm. We understand humans are a bigger threat than them. If you do not bow to us, you will face the four demons of your apocalypse." Gimmy had heard enough, but before he managed to stop the transmission, he heard one final bone-chilling statement that would haunt his nights,

"The Revolution will lead to Order. Comply - or you will die."

Arc 1 - "Revolution"

End

* * *

 **Author's Post-Face**

Thank you so much for reading Arc 1 of Lagann: 2nd Spin. I've staggered the releases as I continue working on new chapters for this story. Regardless of views, reviews, and a slowly dying community of TTGL on this site and others, I intend every ounce of my fiber to finish this work. It is something I explicitly want to do in the coming year in order to pay my tribute to this awesome awesome franchise that had just hit 10 years of release. Please take the time to enjoy this work I've provided you, more is coming, but dropping me a line to let me know that you are also enjoying this will definitely let me know that the TTGL community is still out there, and we're still doing the impossible and seeing the invisible...

...Row row, FIGHT THE POWER!


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